Ash Wednesday
Many of you evangelicals are probably unaware that today is Ash Wednesday unless you have a desk calendar with the holidays pre-printed on it. Ash Wednesday is a beautiful tradition celebrated by many of the more liturgical churches and has a message we as evangelicals could stand to hear. Today marks the beginning of Lent, a season of preparing yourself for Christ. One could argue that we should do this everyday and we should, but it is not harmful for us to pause for a season of repentance and meditation. That is why Lent is observed starting with Ash Wednesday. Throughout this season I will be taking the responsive reading and prayer from this service and expounding upon it until Easter. The liturgy of this day is beautiful, and I have taken the liberty of copying it from the Book of Common Prayer.
“Dear People of God: The first Christians observed with great devotion the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and it became the custom of the Church to prepare for them by a season of penitence and fasting. This is season of Lent provided a time in which converts to the faith were prepared for Holy Baptism. It was also a time when those who, because of notorious sins, had been separated from the body of the faithful were reconciled by penitence and forgiveness, and restored to the fellowship of the Church. Thereby, the whole congregation was put in mind of the message of pardon and absolution set forth in the Gospel of our Savior, and of the need which all Christians continually have to renew their repentance and faith.
I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and editating on God’s holy Word. And, to make a right beginning of repentance, and as a mark of our mortal nature, let us now kneel before the Lord, our maker and redeemer.”
-
-
