Through Stained Glass: The Second Week of Lent -- Becoming Risk Takers

 The Second Week of Lent

“The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you; The market only wants to buy and sell you; Fight to stay awake; Choose the path you take; Even if you don’t know where it’s going; Trust your own unknowing; (Don’t go back to sleep)” Jan Garrett

Reflection Title: Becoming Risk-Takers

Scripture: Genesis 17.1-7, 15-16 & Mark 8.31-38

        Abraham and Sarah were not young in today’s Old Testament reading. In fact, the Biblical narrative records the almost insulting observation that at the time of this Genesis text they were “as good as dead” (Romans 4). This fascinates me since Jesus also talks about what it means to be willing to die in the Gospel lesson from Mark 8. What do these deaths have to do with each other? Some would say the answer is risk-taking faith. Just as Abraham and Sarah stepped into their faith in the seemingly absurd promise of God to give them a son, so the words of Jesus invite us to a similar risk-taking – perhaps even reckless - posture.

        This adventure we call our Lenten journey requires a bit of grit. When we read Jesus’ words and begin to sit with the concept of what in us might need to die, we get uncomfortable. And rightly so! Risk, by very definition, asks us to step outside of the norm. Or maybe better: the known. Some have found it helpful to intentionally center a prayerful question when that familiar discomfort arises. One that often accompanies me is this: “What is asking to die?”

        And while that may seem abrupt for some, to me it’s a way to recognize that just as the life flows generously in my happy pansies in Spring, they also have their day when it withdraws and they die each Fall. They tell me when it’s time, just as your tomato plants or cucumber vines tell you. In honoring the limited lifespan of all growing things, we recognize that God, who is the Source of life, has made everything appropriate in its time (Ecclesiastes 3:11).

        Perhaps what it takes for us to become risk-takers like our ancestors in faith is to recognize that what inspired them can also inspire us. We, too, can envision and participate in working toward the day when “all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well,” even if that day is not today. Even if today we only see death.

        Perhaps it is the process of both reckoning with death but then choosing to participate anyway in this work of faith that we become prophets of a future not our own.

The Questions for the Week:

• What do you feel when you read the words “risk-takers”?
• How could you intentionally center the concept of God as life-giver and death-bringer this week? Does that raise tension for you?

The Practices for the Week:

• Spend time touching, looking at, being present to a living being – maybe a houseplant or a pet. (A human, only if they give consent.) Use this experience as a prayer point to thank God for the risk of imagination and participation it took for them to be alive.
• Spend time with something that reminds you of a being who is no longer alive. Let the feelings well up, whatever they may be, and know that risk-taking faith never asks us to be stoic. It’s always okay to grieve. See if any shifts happen inside you as you meditate on the life that was and how its time is over. Perhaps try noticing how you have changed due to this life and its passing. This, too, is part of becoming.

The Prayer for the Week:

Giver of life,

While alive, we are yours.

Bringer of unknowns,

We surrender, knowing this too is of you. Amen.