- March 12, 2019
Here in the northern hemisphere, Lent comes during springtime, the time for planting. Author Joyce Rupp draws our attention to both the seeds and the earth that will receive them when in A Creed for the Sowing of Seeds she says: “I believe that even the most insignificant aspects of life can be the seed of God’s gifting, that deeper faith can root and mature in very ordinary soil.”
Reflecting on the soil of our everyday lives, and that of Lent, we find that there isn’t much difference. We resolve and then resolve again to practice more consciously the Church’s Lenten emphasis on prayer, fasting and alms giving, but we cannot act on our resolutions alone. We must receive God’s help to make of our lives seeds to plant in our everyday ordinary soil.
We are graced like the seed, to be broken open, to give ourselves to whatever type of soil in which we are to be planted. If we are awake, this breaking open challenges us quietly and mysteriously to be transformed.
Throughout this transformation our God graces us to respond to any challenges which come our way. With kindness we are to be present to others. With increased awareness we are to be compassionate. The discouragement in too many voices calls us to be a source of hope, and sadness invites our deeper understanding of those who need a word of encouragement.
Throughout Lent we are called to follow Jesus’ teaching, trusting in the ordinary soil of God’s gifting and the extraordinary grace of our being seeds transformed.
“In all truth I tell you, unless the grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains only a single grain; but if it dies it yields a rich harvest.” John 12:24