Lent 2020 – Daily Devotional – Introduction
A Creative Lent
You know that feeling you get when you think you should be doing something but don’t really want to do it?
Well before last Christmas I felt that I should repeat creating a set of daily devotions for the season of Advent. I have done in the past, but this time managed to dissuade myself from embarking on the exercise.
However, at our recent Discover Together evening I felt once again challenged to put fingers to keyboard and coloured pencil to paper (more on that later) and create a set of daily thoughts and prayers for Lent.
There are of course hundreds if not thousands of Lenten studies available, on the internet or as books or pamphlets. This year I have the All We Can and Christian Aid resources both of which are excellent and which I commend to you to consider as well. Having said that I from time to time find it more helpful, in my own devotions, to force myself to be active and creative rather than receiving from someone else.
Having decided to discipline myself into creating the material it is just as easy to share it and so I am going to do so on the Hatfield Road Methodist Church website. I am very relaxed about whether anyone uses it but hope that if you dip into it you will find it helpful.
The hard part, for me at least, in creating these resources, is selecting the Bible passages to use to stimulate my thinking. In the summer whilst in a Christian bookshop in Norwich I found a book of reflections for Advent which used the gospel of Luke as its source for the whole season. At the time I thought this might be quite challenging, as you will guess the Christmas story is completed on the 2nd day of Advent but despite that I did think it was a great and challenging idea.
Having tucked that thought away in the back of my mind. I have now brought it back to the fore and decided it would be a good exercise to use the gospel of Luke as my source material for this set of Lenten reflections and prayers. So we will through Lent travel through the whole of the gospel as we travel with Jesus and his disciples towards Holy Week and Easter Day. It is largely a chapter a day, half a chapter on some days, and the subject will be selected from what speaks to me in those passages. If you do decide to read some or all of these please do read the chapter and see what takes your mind. Whether it is the same thing as me or completely different take time to listen for God’s voice in what speaks to you.
The series follow my normal pattern of a Bible passage, a thought on that passage and then some material to assist a time of reflection or prayer.
These will be a reflective few words from the passage, a series of prayers and just to add to my workload a daily sketch of something the passage has spoken to me about. I am a terrible drawer but really felt this is something I needed to do and so I will.
If you like something a little more “traditional” I have moved my reflections from a few years ago over from the old website and these will sit beside the new reflections for each day.
Ideas and thoughts are mine and may not reflect those of all members of the St Albans and Welwyn Circuit but I hope they will stimulate your thoughts during Lent.
Chris
