And for you, too.
Historical ping
Pride? What are you giving up for Lent?!? I'm giving up chocolate! It is soooo hard!
Roland Barnes, pastor Trinity Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Statesboro, Ga. He also serves on the board of the Christian Missionary Society.
Preach to your own flock, OK?
Who gives a hoot what you have to say.
Lenten sacrifice is a personal thing, and it is not for you to say publicly what your self-centered ideas are,at least if you expect credibility.
That's Catholicism in a nutshell.
And they even try to misquote Scripture to justify it.
Matthew 22:37
Lent: One more made-up, unscriptural thing, along with
Last rites
Holy water
Rosary beads
Purgatory
Peter = rock on which church is built
Peter/rock = pope
...the list goes on...
I generally try to add a positive thing or habit to my life.
When IHS dissed the Pharisees for conspicuous displays of devotion, he said they did it in anticipation of praise.
On FreeRepublic and in other venues, a Catholic who chooses the OPTIONAL (youknow that, right? It’s OPTIONAL? A Catholic doesn’t HAVE to get ashes or even to go to Mass on Ash Wednesday) practice of having his forehead marked with ashes can be assured of being mocked.
So the comparison with the pharisees wouldn’t seem to hold up. They did it for praise. We do it in spite of insult, judgment, and contempt.
And as we continue to bash each other’s choice of Christianity, forms of self-denial (or not), ISIS continues their romp. Think those Coptic Christians ISIS did away with recently were concerned about which Christian or from of Christianity is more “right”?
There are times when I am quite astonished at the ignorance of the learned.
I don't keep Lent for merit or for a reward, anymore than I eat or make love or sleep for merit or a reward, or any more than I offer thanks before I eat for merit or a reward.
The grave peril of the pious, or ONE grave peril, is that they so readily forget the wonder of God's Love. We can turn in a heartbeat from meditation on the love to abuse of family members. Indeed, my hardest evangelical work (And I don't try to make people Catholic; I try to get them to entertain and to allow themselves to FEEL “the Love which moves the sun and other stars.” If they become Catholic, well, cool! But that's not what I'm about) ... my hardest evangelical work is with people brought up in households where the Love was professed — and the wives and the children were beaten.
And, I don't doubt that the evangelical professions were sincere. I just think they were SHALLOW.
And one REASON for that shallowness was the “looking in a mirror, walking away, and forgetting what you saw” phenomenon. In moments of grace, we are swept up in the Love. But then the bill-collector calls. And “straightway” we forget what we saw in the mirror.
Faithfulness is indeed a gift. It is also a virtue, and that means it must be practiced. So, how do we practice? We practice remembering!
And how to we remember in everyday life? We write ourselves notes. We turn our rings around or tie a string around our finger. We do simple homely things to prod our memory.
And so with ashes or the “penances” of Lent. At every meal, my self-imposed deprivation is a REMINDER — not just to remember but to meditate on the appalling mercy of God. The silliness, for such it is, of a smudge on the head is a “prompt” to consider that I, as insignificant (on the ‘merits’) as a streak of ashes, was yet deemed somehow worth the death of the Lord.
Lent is not to EARN something, any more than a diet is to earn something. I am healthier if I control my eating. I am happier if I control my memory by directing it more often to the mighty acts of God.
And if God's Church is directed by his mercy to provide me with companions on the way, and if we laugh about chocolate or sugar or our TV show or what have you, well, go ahead and mock. We are merrily journeying to the death of the Cross and to what lies beyond. A little laughter, even judgment and contempt, they won't hinder us much.
The perfection, as he tells us, of the writer is admirable. But I think that rather than admire him, I will be wily (PS. 18: 26)with my crooked self and with humble and silly tricks beguile it into recalling the Love of God.
Fasting is a biblical discipline that can be defended from both the Old and the New Testament. Christ expected his disciples to fast (Mt 9:14-15) and issued instructions for how they should do so (Mt 6:16-18).
Abstinence from certain foods is also a biblical discipline. In Daniel 10:2-3 we read, “In those days I, Daniel, was mourning for three weeks. I ate no delicacies, no meat or wine entered my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, for the full three weeks.” Catholics use a practice similar to Daniel’s when, as a way of commemorating Christ’s Crucifixion on a Friday, they abstain from eating meat on that day of the week during Lent. The only kind of flesh they eat on Friday is fish, which is a symbol of Christ.
You honestly don't see the irony in a statement like that?
"Regarding extra-biblical statements of doctrine like the Westminster Confession of Faith, Campion the Freeper states, 'They have no authority or power to bind me, and the opinions they express are just that -- opinions which I am not bound to accept, and am free to reject, without the slightest trace of guilt or implication of sin.'"
Has as much value and makes as much sense.
Seeing people like Joe Biden piously walking around with their foreheads smudged on Ash Wednesday, reminds me of Jesus' admonition:
And when you fast, don't make it obvious, as the hypocrites do, for they try to look miserable and disheveled so people will admire them for their fasting. I tell you the truth, that is the only reward they will ever get. (Matt. 6:16)
But isn’t this ashes + penance humbling of oneself such a nice work of supererogation, that one can thus add a little more to improve and embroider the work Jesus did on the Cross? /sarc
A long article which essentially says “I don’t observe lent because Catholics do.”