Lent at Redemption Church

We haven’t historically put a lot of emphasis on observing Lent at Redemption Church, but as we have been preaching through Matthew’s Gospel on Sunday mornings we have been turning our eyes very purposefully toward Jerusalem, the cross, and the resurrection of Christ our King. As mentioned before, we will be keeping pace with the story in Matthew as we are led through the seasons of Lent, the Passion of Christ, and Resurrection Sunday.  

As Advent is to Christmas so Lent is to Resurrection Sunday. It is a time of preparation, and we encourage you to walk through this season with some intentionality together looking toward what lies at the end of the road; a bloody cross where Jesus died, but also an empty tomb from which our Savior rose again. 

Lent begins on Wednesday, March 1st this year. Traditionally, Lent is a 40 day period of fasting, prayer and devotion towards remembering our brokenness and God’s work of redemption through the person and work of Jesus Christ. We aren’t looking to establish a bunch of rules and regulations about how to observe Lent this season, but we are inviting you to take the next couple of weeks to consider how you might best observe Lent as a family, with your missional communities, in DNA’s, and as a church.

 

Here are a few recommended resources:

 

Journey to the Cross  – By Will Walker and Kendal Haug

Journey to the Cross serves as a combined liturgical guide and devotional—presenting a call to worship, confessional, gospel reading, and daily devotional with application. This compact devotional guide meets the needs of Christians who want to prepare their hearts for Easter but don’t know how, and it answers the growing desire of many to be connected to the broader history of the church.”

 

Lent For Everyone: Matthew – Tom Wright

For each day of Lent, there is a reading chosen from the Gospel designated for the year, plus a reflection by Tom Wright.”

You can also subscribe to this devotional material via the You Version Bible app.

 

God is on the Cross: Reflections on Lent and Easter – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

These forty stirring devotions will guide and inspire readers as they move thematically through the weeks of Lent and Easter, encountering themes of prayerful reflection, self-denial, temptation, suffering, and the meaning of the cross. Passages from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s letters and sermons provide special encouragement as readers prepare themselves spiritually for Holy Week and Easter Sunday. Supplemented by an informative introduction to Bonhoeffer’s life and a Scripture passage for each day of the season, these daily devotions are moving reminders of the true gift of Christ on the cross.”

 

Lenten Devotionals – Redeemer Presbyterian Church

“In 2011 Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York published 40 Lenten Devotions written by a variety of authors including Kathy Keller. Due to popular demand over successive years, RPC have continued to make the devotions available to help their people ‘prepare their hearts for Easter.”

This devotional material is also available through the You Version Bible app.

Spotlight: The Doris Building

The historic and beautiful Doris Building is home not only to the Redemption Church family, but also serves as a bridge to the local community as an event facility that the public can access for their special occasions. We don’t just want to be an empty storefront during the week with a presence in the vibrant downtown Augusta community on Sunday mornings. While utilizing our space as a rental facility provides additional income that helps to cover the expenses of owning a building, the primary focus of using our building in this manner is to be a good neighbor to other businesses by bringing more people downtown to events.

The process to reserve a date at the building starts digitally, with a visit to thedorisbuilding.com.
There, interested parties can find pricing, event rules, available dates and a form to fill out to schedule a building tour.

After a prospective client tours the building, a rental agreement (or contract) is drafted and a deposit is paid to hold the date. So far, the Doris Building has been host to over 20 events, including spoken word poetry slams, fundraisers, birthday parties and fashion shows. We have also partnered with Augusta Sports Council and Arts in the Heart for some of their events.

We look forward to a busy spring schedule, with four community events already booked for March and the Augusta Handmade Fair coming the first weekend in May. Visit the Doris Building website or email info@thedorisbuilding.com for more information about our facility.

Lean Into the Tension

I was at a conference a couple of years ago where the speaker, Reggie Joiner, gave out rubber bands to everybody in attendance. When he stepped on stage he instructed the audience to the throw the rubber bands at each other. There was plenty of laughter as rubber bands flopped against shoulders around the arena. He then instructed us to shoot the rubber band at the person seated next to us. Of course, he quickly took that instruction back before somebody got hurt. As Joiner moved on with his message, which was very good, this object lesson stuck with me. It illustrated well that where there is tension there is power.

Obviously, the power that is generated from places of tension can have, and has had, horrific effects on the people of the world. Wars break out because of tension. Bombs are dropped. Men and women kill each other, and children are orphaned and murdered. Eventually one side forces the other into submission, but nobody ever really wins. We all lose when tension leads to violent demonstrations of power.

It’s hard to stomach thoughts about the realities and effects of war. Unfortunately, it’s often easier than admitting that I am guilty of allowing personal tensions and frustrations with others – even my family and friends – to be unleashed in disgusting demonstrations of my own power as I put myself first above all else. I’ve hurt the people I say that I love on purpose. I have intentionally aimed to make others feel worthless compared to me. You have done it too. All that is left in the wake, when all of our power has been exerted and spent, is perpetual division, conflict, and brokenness.

Reggie Horne, in his message entitled Faith where he references the language of Fredrick Douglas, says “when we focus our faith on anything other than Jesus, we end up with a faith that leads to failure and defeat; a faith that will crush our souls and darken our minds.”

Here’s the thing, I’m not sure that we should make it our goal to just relieve tensions and lay down our rubber bands. I believe we were made for tension by being created by God to be unique and relational at the same time. You have your own gifts, talents, and skills, and we each have our own backgrounds and stories that give us different, but valuable, perspectives and insights. The idea shouldn’t be to make the tension disappear but to learn how to harness its generated power and aim it together instead of at each other. The only way that happens is if we keep our eyes on Jesus, submit ourselves to the Spirit, and strive together towards making Jesus known; that’s what we were made for.

A few months ago Chip and Joanna Gaines, from the HGTV show Fixer Upper, received some negative press because of their countercultural beliefs regarding homosexuality. They let the dust settle a bit before Chip published a blog post responding to the tension that had arisen. Here is a quote from Chip’s post that I found encouraging:

“If your position only extends love to the people who agree with you, we want to respectfully challenge that position. We propose operating with a love so real and true that you are willing to roll up your sleeves and work alongside the very people that are most unlike you. Fear dissolves in close proximity. Our stereotypes and vain imaginations fall away when we labor side by side(emphasis added).

 

He is picking up on the language that Paul uses in Philippians 1:27-28; “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel,  and not frightened in anything by your opponents.”

Church, our culture desperately needs the unifying power of Jesus. If we are going to take the gospel to them then we first need to see that we were created, and have been called, to work together to make Jesus known. Paul gives us a good place to start in Philippians 2:3-4 on; “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Something big happens when we lean into each other for the sake of the gospel. Consider the Jerusalem Council of Acts 15 or Paul confronting Peter in Galatians 2. There are many places where tensions rose in the New Testament church, but as they looked to Jesus and pressed in by the Spirit, the gospel advanced to the nations.

What would happen today if we humbly looked to Jesus and leaned into the tension together in our homes, in our DNA’s and missional communities, and in our church?

Over the next few weeks we will talk more about handling our tensions and conflicts, the importance of listening to the perspectives of others, and how to strategically aim our rubber bands together to proclaim the gospel loudly.

For today, may we pray and find resolve to lean in together and to be found “striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.”