DN 9:4B-10
PS 79:8, 9, 11 AND 13
LK 6:36-38
In the reading from Deuteronomy,
we encounter our God who is compassionate, merciful, and forgiving in the face
of human sin. It is easy to be grateful for this God who unwaveringly loves us
enough to define us by more than our worst mistakes. What is not so easy,
however, is to be like our God in the expanse of our mercifulness as Jesus in
the Gospel of Luke implores to. Jesus’ call to be merciful as God is in
actuality the call to emulate the life of Christ that is central to the season
of Lent.
Often, I am caught up
in an impulse during Lent to “prove myself” to God, and I allow myself to
believe that sacrifices during Lent help me show God that I am capable of doing
good and therefore I myself am “good.” With this mindset, I have sometimes used
Lent as a time to try to earn God’s love, to somehow show that I am worthy and
lovable through my acts of self-denial. But God’s love is not contingent upon
my goodness and that love does not disappear because of my mistakes; it is
God’s mercy that allows God to love me for who I am exactly where I am. Receiving
this love then requires that I respond by being like the God who has extended
so much compassion and mercy to me.
Remembering
this call to mercy, Lent becomes an invitation to live more like Christ in the depth
of our compassion rather than a time to impress God. Lent is the time to shift
questions away from asking if others
deserve our compassion so that we might begin to ask how we might be merciful as God is merciful and extend compassion
to all who are struggling. Lent is also
a wonderful time to examine how intentional we are about caring for even those
who we usually think are not worthy of our compassion. To be merciful as God is
merciful, we must remember that to God no one is unworthy of compassion. If we
regularly ignore the struggles of those who are incarcerated, those who suffer
from addiction, or even our own parents, we are called especially during Lent to
enter into the realities of others and accompany them as God accompanies us.
Julia Nouse is a sophomore studying theology.
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