Holy Communion Anglican Church
East Greenwich, RI – Standing Firm on Biblical Truth and Christian Tradition
This is not season for discouragement, but season for hope, a season for optimism. We are not alone; we are accompanied by the Triune God and all the heavenly host, as well as all the angels and saints praying for us in heaven and working beside us here on earth. The harvest is ripe, brothers and sisters - what a time to be alive! We know that many people today are hurting, and the only thing that can heal their wounds is the love of Christ.
Beloved, the victory that Christ won over sin has given us greater blessings than those which sin had taken away from us. Let Lent be a reminder to us that there is a much higher purpose that exists beyond our mortal pain, as we march on to the joy of our Easter Vigil in this life, and eternal reward in the next. O happy fault!
We may not be able to see all which God is doing to redeem our present difficulties, but we can see His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, standing before us, ready to sustain us, and asking, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” My dear brothers and sisters, we have seen Him; He is here, and He is able to keep us from falling and bring us to his glorious presence, without fault and with great joy. May we respond like the man born blind, saying, “Lord, I believe.”
Since the days of the Early Church, the season of Lent provided a time when converts to the Faith were prepared for Holy Baptism; when those who were separated from the Body of the Faithful were reconciled by penitence and forgiveness and restored to the Church; and all Christians reminded of their need to renew their repentance and faith.
The Epiphany has not ended; it shines forth to this day, radiating out from the day of Christ’s Incarnation; it is the very reason we as Gentiles can share in the riches of Christ’s inheritance. This means that we who have received this light have the responsibility to both continually seek its source and reflect it so that others may do the same.
It is important for the Church to continually look forward in prayer to understand as best we can the cultural trends coming our way, that we may faithfully prepare the next generation, and each other, to do the work of ministry. One such trend for thinking Christians to consider is not specifically cultural but instead technological, though the two are closely intertwined. This is the trend of artificial intelligence (AI), a field progressing far more rapidly than many realize.
With the passing of Queen Elizabeth, we lose one of the final links in the chain of history which binds us to the storied history and tradition, and indeed the greatness of Western Civilization, blessed by God and founded on Judeo-Christian principles, to which we owe nearly every comfort and luxury which we enjoy today.
Our innermost desire is to be fully known and yet fully loved, and that can only be satisfied by the eternal love of God. No one can know you more fully, and love you more perfectly, than God can. You are not a creature of your own self-definition; rather, you are a being made in the perfect image of God, and therefore deserving of dignity from conception to final breath.
Few hurts are more personal than that of betrayal. Yet, Jesus loved his betrayer radically and sacrificially, with full knowledge of the evil that would befall him.
The season of Lent is a spiritual retreat - a time where we can take a step back and listen to God’s voice, who points us to the areas of our life which prevent us from living rightly before Him. In other words, the Lord reminds us of our continual need for repentance, to draw near to His Son Jesus Christ and so live according to the Truth (with a capital “T”). Beloved, it is my prayer that we would recognize the importance and urgency of sober self-assessment and repentance this Lenten season.