Devotional – March 4, 2025

An “Almost Lent” Prayer by Rev. Lori Walke

Pastor – Mayflower Congregational UCC

We have a few days, Holy One, before it starts. Lent, that is. The liturgical calendar, the bulletin, the announcements, and the preacher all tell us to get our ashes here on Wednesday that we might get the party started, so to speak. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

But we haven’t really decided if Lent is for us or not. 

For starters, some of us have high anxiety about deciding what it is that we’re supposed to do or not do during the forty days of Lent. It feels like the church version of New Year’s Resolutions, and given that we aren’t doing super great with those, why pile on?

We are also not jazzed about hearing, again, how this is a season of wandering in the wilderness. Bless our hearts, we are so over that metaphor. 

But we also know that we need something to anchor us these days. We need ritual and and discipline and quiet to ground us. We need to be reminded that we don’t have to be perfect to get it right.

So be with us on Wednesday afternoon, Holy One, when we try to talk ourselves out of it because we’re tired from work and deciding what’s for dinner and errands and caregiving and a thousand other things. Remind us that mercy and grace await, but the choice is ours. The invitation is open.

We pray in the name of our teacher Jesus, who went first. Amen.

Peace Be With You. – Paul