Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent
I love you! How often do we say these words? I love you! How often do we hear these words? I love you! How often do we let these words settle into our souls in a way that allows us to be lifted up? If we could go back ten or twenty years and tell our younger selves a few things what would they be?
Twenty-five years ago, almost to the day, it was about six weeks until my fiance and I were to be married. There was probably plenty of grumbling and scrambling. Finding a place to live, wedding details, moving and covering work while we were gone for our honeymoon. Those days were overwhelming for me and the bride to be. But if I could tell myself one thing, it would be this faith-filled woman whom you are marrying truly loves you. And then I would say, “Believe it!”
In the first reading today, we find the Israelites grumbling with God because their liberation living was difficult. As God allowed the serpents to bite Israelites, killing some they realized that their repentance might turn things around. At God’s command, Moses’ had a bronze serpent lifted up on a pole and all who looked at were saved. A millennia later Jesus was lifted up on a cross, stretched out his arms and we who look at it and believe are saved. It is said that the nails were not what held him to the cross his love did.
Our lives are upside down in so many ways and we may feel like the Israelites? Our lives before sheltering in place may have felt freer. I read one of our young adults saying this is the Lentest Lent we have ever had. They may be correct; we are being tested. This Lent way is freer, in that many of our worldly distractions have been stripped away. What remains, what helps us be lifted up now is faith, family, friends, and love. Lord, let this time continue to lift our hearts up so that we believe ever more deeply that Your love has saved us.
- Deacon Michael Montgomery