I really hope that by the time you read this, the snow and ice have gone! As I write, the snow is still coming down, the roads are un-gritted and the pavements are just sheets of ice. I think the only people rubbing their (chilled!) hands with glee must be car repairers, and makers of plaster-of-paris (to set broken limbs)!
Many people have really suffered this winter, as the cold winter spell just seems to have gone on forever, and, this month, in our Church’s year, we enter the Church’s winter season, Lent.
Some years ago a friend of mine said, “I hate Lent… it’s all dreary hymns, mournful readings and depressing sermons”. I have to say, he didn’t attend a Church that I was a minister at!
However, there is an element of truth in what he said. Lent is a period when we think about Jesus “setting his face” to go to Jerusalem, knowing he would suffer and die, and preparing his disciples for that fact. It reminds us that being a Christian doesn’t take us out of the world so that our lives are always bright cheerful and sunny, but rather we go through pain and suffering just like any other person… the difference is that we know that God is with us to comfort, support and guide us. Perhaps, like me, you are rightly suspicious of the “Christian grin”… that forced smile that makes you wonder what the bearer has been up to! How can we get alongside people unless we have been through difficult times in our lives, and how could our Lord truly identify with us unless he had experienced real life (and death) in all its gory reality.
But, of course, with hindsight, we know the end of the story… that Jesus didn’t stay dead, but was raised to life and promises us a place with him in his kingdom. And what a promise!
