[re]imagine Lent: 3/6/2023
We encourage you to sign up for the 40-40-40 Lenten Challenge, a challenge with our partner Southeastern Iowa Synod to participate in Lenten practices, including these daily devotions. Just signing up counts as participation! More info here.
“For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.”
Sometimes Paul can get so wordy, and the 4th and 5th chapters of Romans are prime examples of this! However, in this two-verse nugget, I was struck today by how my faith comes to me as a gift in part because of one person – Abraham – who trusted God’s unbelievable promise. God’s promise, that Abraham would be the ‘father of many nations’ is just one example of how God gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. So much of our faith and shared life in congregations recall these stories – we read them in worship, we recite the Creed and Lord’s Prayer, we share the peace, and we sit down at God’s table – but do we think about the fact that our faith is not just for us?
If our faith is due, in part, to Abraham’s faithful action, then it could stand to say that our faith is also for others. I wonder how our faith gives witness to the fact that we believe God can call things into existence that do not exist. And by faith, remember, I mean the verb, that is to say, steps and action. So how does our faith and trust in God’s abundant power call into existence peace in our war-torn world? How does our faith call into existence a world where, like at the Communion Table, all people find a welcome and are fed? The God who brings life to the dead is the same God who holds and calls you, disciple and beloved child, and who calls forth in you amazing things that do not exist so that your presence in this world might be a gift for others.
Prayer
God of everlasting promise, in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus you have called me to a life of grace and faith. By your Spirit empower me to believe and so believing to act, that living in your salvation I might leave behind all that no longer gives life and step into a future you are calling into existence. Join my faith and gifts with others in my life so that together our faith becomes your gift living in the world. Amen.
Journal Prompt
Lent calls us to practices of faith. Reflect on your own life of faith. When has God called you to take a step into something new? How did you respond? Or, ask yourself if God is currently calling you, like Abram, to leave something behind so that you can start something new, even if that new thing has yet to be revealed. How does that call make you feel?
Week Two Devotions by Rev. Erika Uthe, uthe@seiasynod.org