This week begins the season of Lent. In the Christian year, Lent is the 40 day period leading up to Easter where we fast, pray, repent, and prepare ourselves to celebrate the Resurrection of Christ. In many ways, Lent reflects Jesus’ 40 days in the wilderness before he began his public ministry, and Christians all over the world are unified in this holy practice.
This Lent, as a practice community, we want to go deep into one of the Lenten themes: Lament. With all that’s going on in the world these days, and all that’s going on inside each one of us, we long to be a community that knows how to weep, mourn, and lament well. The reality is that our culture—and even our christian tradition—does not teach us how to do this. Over 30% of the Psalms in the bible are laments, and right around 0% of the top 100 Christian worship songs are laments. As a result, our faith can get lopsided and we don’t alway know how to engage the full reality of life.
But thankfully, by God’s grace, we can learn the biblical practice of lament. We can learn how to hold the heartbreak, the injustice, and the evil in the world before God, and weep. We can learn how to hold our own brokenness, disappointments, and sorrow before God, and weep. And as we do, we learn that God doesn’t always fix the issue, but He does something infinitely more profound: God weeps with us. And then invites us to join His work of healing.
Here’s the journey…
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Feb 14 – Why Lament? – Jonathan Martin offers a vision and invitation into this practice.
Feb 21 – What is Lament? – Curtis Miller teaches about lament in the scriptures.
Feb 28 – How do I Lament? – Jenna Perrine guides us through a 10-step process to write our own lament.
Mar 6 – Sharing our Lament – Instead of gathering in the chapel, we’ll meet in living rooms on Sunday night to share our laments with a trusted friend or smaller tribe. The Practice team will offer a “table liturgy” to help you create holy space on that night.
Mar 13 – The Brilliance: Concert of Lament and Hope – The Brilliance returns to lead us deeply into the practice of lament and hope through liturgy and song.
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Friends, please join us for this journey. Lean deeply into this important practice of being fully human, and let’s see how God forms us over the next 40 days.
And remember, even as we weep, mourn, and wail…Easter is coming.
Grace and peace,
Aaron and The Practice Team