Dear Five O' Clock Friends,

All week long I've had earbugs--not the kind of bugs Mrs. Piggle Wiggle might have said crawl in the ears of naughty children who do not properly wash their ears--but the kind of earbugs that play songs over and over in your mind.  One of the earbugs that's been echoing in my mind is that beautiful Wesley hymn "Love Divine All Loves Excelling."  I'm stuck in the last stanza of that hymn.  It goes like this:    

Finish, then, thy new creation; 
 pure and spotless let us be. 
 Let us see thy great salvation 
 perfectly restored in thee;   
 changed from glory into glory, 
 till in heaven we take our place, 
 till we cast our crowns before thee, 
 lost in wonder, love, and praise. 

I suppose it was the "changed from glory into glory" that first caught my attention.  After all, this Sunday we will hear the story of Jesus' transfiguration--that moment when he glows as he talks with Moses and Elijah and when God says to Peter and James and John, "This is my son, my beloved. Listen to him."  
Every year we hear the same story on the last Sunday before Lent.  Every year we hear about Jesus taking Peter and James and John up the mountain where, before their very eyes, he is changed--Charles Wesley might say "changed from glory into glory."  Every year we hear Peter say, "We can build three booths."  And every year we hear that idea interrupted by God saying, "This is my son, my beloved.  Listen to him."   
"Listen to him."  What a way to close a scene!  It makes me wonder, "What comes next?" 
 
They climb down the mountain and they encounter the other disciples trying to heal a young boy of his seizures.  The disciples are frustrated because all their efforts have been for naught.  Jesus, after sizing up the situation, says to his disciples, "Some things can be healed only through prayer."  
"Listen to him."
 
"Some things you can do only through prayer."
 
What if these two sayings of Jesus were our guideposts through Lent? What if we as a community and as individuals focused, really focused on listening to Jesus as we made our way through Lent?  Several years ago, I was going through a really hard patch of life.  A time that challenged even my sense of myself as priest.  I was at a loss for what to do, for how to navigate through the dark cloud in which I found myself.  A friend, a seminary professor and Baptist minister listened to my woes.  Then he said, "Live the Gospel as best you can."  I did.  That made all the difference in the world.  "This is my son, my beloved.  Listen to him."

This Lent we at Live at Five will be doing our best to listen to the one who calls us to feed the hungry, house the homeless, visit the sick and imprisoned, and give clothes to the naked.  We can't do it all, but what we can do is tithe a portion of our weekly grocery bill.  When we go to the grocery store, we can set aside some money to purchase supplies for the Food Pantry.  (Right now they desperately need dry dog food and personal hygiene supplies.)  And we can clean our closets and bring to Live at Five clean clothes we no longer wear. (I'll make sure the clothes get to St. Martin's.)
 
But I don't want us to forget those words Jesus said when he was confronted by the disciples' frustration and the person in need.  Remember he said, "Some things can be healed only through prayer."  A second part of Live at Five's journey through Lent will be a focus on prayer--corporate prayer and personal prayer.  On the first Sunday of Lent we will together pray the Litany of Penitence found in our Book of Common Prayer.  On the first, second and fourth Sundays of Lent (March 9, March 16 and March 30) we will offer an opportunity to pray the rosary at 4:30 p.m.  
 
My prayer for all of us is that we be "lost in wonder, love and praise" as we focus on God who working in us and through us can do far more than we ourselves can do.
 
May we keep a holy Lent.
 
Susan+

Dear Five O' Clock Friends,
 
Sometimes one word can change one's whole way of looking at things. So it was for me this week. A couple of weeks ago, I had decided to preach from the Leviticus text assigned for the 7th Sunday of Epiphany. I had never worked with that text before, and I had never really read Leviticus either. (And truth be told, I still haven't read all of Leviticus-you can catch it's drift pretty quickly.) I found myself focusing on one word in that text-holy. It's used more frequently in Leviticus than in any other book of the Bible. "You shall be holy." "I am holy." A dance of our holiness and God's holiness.

All that talk of holiness less than two weeks before Lent begins. It got me wondering, "Just what am I saying on Ash Wednesday when I say to the people of God, 'I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent...." The text in the prayer book goes on to detail just what the Book of Common Prayer considers a Holy Lent-self-examination, repentance, prayer, fasting, self-denial, reading and meditating on God's holy Word.

I wonder-are those words I want to be saying to people who fast every day because there is not enough food to feed their family? Do I want to say to people who, by their poverty and/or homelessness are denied the luxury of self? Shall I say to a person riddled with self-doubt, "Do some self-examination?" We schooled in the nuances of theological conversation understand repentance as a turning (or returning) to God. But I wonder if my friend Judy who, every time she sees me says "Thank you for being kind to me", hears it that way. I wonder if my friend Judy hears the word repentance and thinks of all her alleged short-comings.

Self-examination makes sense-especially if it focuses on the ways we are drawing closer to God and to our neighbor. Spending time in prayer and making an effort to deepen one's prayer life are important foci at any point in the church year, but particularly in a season when we draw closer to the One who draws close to us. Reading and meditating on scriptures are also good ways to deepen our understanding of God's life with God's people.

Perhaps, at it's core, that invitation to keep a holy Lent, is an invitation to draw closer to God by aligning one's life to God's life as best we can and in ways appropriate to our own individual life situation.

My brothers and sisters, I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent. As those ashes are placed on your forehead, "Remember that you are God's, and to God you shall return."

 Susan+

Dear Five O' Clock Friends,

Tomorrow St. Michael's, San Gabriel and Live at Five serve at St. Martin's.  Some folks will head straight to the kitchen while others will make their way to the back of the shelter to join the Congregation of St. Martin's in worship.  Today, I've been holding both Live at Five and the Congregation of St. Martin's in prayer as I reflect on the week gone by in light of the scripture we'll hear tomorrow. 

Here's a part of the scripture Philip will read tomorrow morning:

Jesus said, "You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

"You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."

And here are snippits of the week gone by:                                                   

• A woman, a poet, a person who lives on the street, says to Karen, the client advocate at St. Martin's, "I love St. Martin's but I won't go there now that they ask me for my number--I  don't want to be "just" a number." 
  
• "You'll bring me glutten-free wafers?  I feel special."
  
• A friend tells me the story of one of his friends--a woman who spent a lifetime neglected and abused; a woman shocked when she's the recipient of simple human kindness.
  
• two men--one just released from prison and the other just released from the hospital--come way late to St. Martin's.  "I've had nothing to eat since yesterday" says one, and the other chimes in, "Neither have I."                                                                                           
  

Tomorrow, some of us will gather early in the morning at St. Martin's Hospitality Center.  And tomorrow afternoon others will join together for compline at five.  We'll be light--the bright morning light or the diffuse light of late afternoon--light not hid under a bushel basket.

Susan+