Mar 7 - "Begin Again"

Romans 8:1-10
"There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit."
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Today is the 3rd Sunday in the season of Lent. Many of us made a commitment, as is the tradition, to "give something up" during the time from Ash Wednesday to Easter. The question of the day is, "how are things going?".

On Ash Wednesday, we thought about a thing which we would set aside during this time. For some, it may have been a simple pleasure such as chocolate, soft drinks, snacks or the occasional glass of wine. For others, it may have been something more focused on forcing oneself into a penitential frame of mind. One friend of mine committed to giving up escalators and elevators and taking the stairs everywhere. This person, whenever she was trudging up or down stairs, committed to set her mind on the sacrifice Christ made for 40 days in the desert.

If you did make the choice to sacrifice something for Lent, have you been able to stick with it? Are you still fulfilling the commitment, or have you forgotten, or perhaps purposefully set aside the task after missing your goal early on.

We all fall short of the rules, the "law" at times; even the ones we place on ourselves. We each have a litany of things we have committed to do and failed. If we look back on those things, is there a common element to what we chose to pursue and then put aside? Did we set the bar too high? Did we hold ourselves to a standard which was unreasonable?

When you set the goal, did you tell anyone about it? Maybe the goal was achievable, but because you made the deal with yourself in quiet, there was no external accountability or support to make it happen. I wrote in a previous post about my belief in the power of words. A goal, when spoken aloud, when said to others besides yourself, becomes more real. You enable those around you to provide encouragement, helping you achieve your target as opposed to unintentionally abetting its downfall.

So, begin again. Say it out loud and renew your commitment. If you have fallen short of your original target, whether for Lent or something larger, it's OK to start over and try again. We live in Christ. He died once for all of us to forgive all of our sins and our shortcoming. Forgive yourself and be new again, for God's power to forgive and renew us over and over again is greater than our ability to deny ourselves His grace.