I expected things to change, for life to be different, but there was nothing. There were the same number of things on my “to-do list” and e-mails to respond to, laundry to complete and weeds to pull. Nothing seemed to change last Wednesday like I thought it should.

Last Wednesday began our season of Lent. Lent is the forty days prior to Easter. These forty days are symbolic of Jesus’ forty days in the wilderness and the forty years of the Israelites in the desert where they were tested, challenged and learned how to depend upon God. The season has often been described to me as forty days of giving up and taking on. People give up chocolate, TV, Facebook and take on prayer, time with God and a better Christian lifestyle. For forty days we are to pray, confess and contemplate our walk with Jesus.

We begin these forty days on Ash Wednesday. At Pinnacle we join on Wednesday evening for worship, communion and the imposition of ashes. We place the ashes on our foreheads as a sign and symbol of the dust we came from described in Genesis and the dust that we will return to in death. The life and death that comes from God and lives with us during our busy, stressful and sometimes hectic lives.

But after the service was over and I had been anointed with the cross of ashes on my forehead nothing seemed different. You would think I would feel the holy presence of Jesus, ready to hunker down and spend these forty days together. But I could only think about the mountain of emails, a long list of to do items and the spirit I expected to change in me as we began Lent, wasn’t really there.

I expected to feel like I had entered a holy season, a time when moments for prayer would be more evident. The feeling of God’s presence was swirling around me, and the anticipation of Easter would be as exciting as Christmas morning, but I got up Thursday morning feeling exactly the same way.

That is when I realized that the emails, to-do lists and my attitude of life around me was never going to change unless I changed. Jesus asks us to change not by stopping what we are doing, but by seeing our days differently. Lent isn’t the season when God writes the 11^th commandment, thou shall find time for me today…Lent is the season of recognizing that we don’t always know where Jesus is in our day. We are asked to allow ourselves to be lost, so that instead of finding God where we want to see him (and in turn, ignoring God in other places of our lives) we let the Holy Spirit find us.

I realized that I was expecting Jesus to show up with a Where’s Jesus picture page (like Where’s Waldo, but better) so that I could spend these forty days searching for Jesus. Jesus would know what I needed to work on, but that would mean that our relationship was all about me. I needed to find Jesus, I needed to work harder, I needed to plan my prayer time more efficiently. It is just the opposite, which is why Lent is so difficult. Jesus doesn’t want us to find him, instead He wants us to stop and let Jesus find us. Lent is about letting our busy, full and sometimes stressful lives be set aside so that Jesus can enter those place too.

Our journey with Jesus doesn’t change in an instant; remember, it took forty years for the Israelites in the wilderness to figure it out. Use these forty days to allow Jesus to enter every corner of our life and be present.

My daughter, Amie, my two grandsons, Liam and Jayden, in Utrecht, the Netherlands

A few weeks ago I was in Holland visiting my daughter, her husband, and my two grandsons. Only when you become a grandparent do you understand why your friends, seemingly normal and reasonable people otherwise, go berzerk-o when they become grandparents. 

It is an unspeakable blessing if, in our life cycle, we can rear our own children and live long enough to see a grandchild. Seeing a grandchild opens our eyes once again to the miracle of life. 

As I have become involved in Pinnacle, I have witnessed our ministry to children in its various manifestations. I am reminded that of all the things we do here, this is job one: to love these children, to care for them, to protect them, and in so doing lead them on to Another who is perfect love.

Do you know the writings of the late Erma Bombeck? Her insights on parenting always made me laugh—or cry. Here is what she wrote to her children when they were grown.

“To the first born......
I've always loved you best because you were our first miracle. You were the genesis of a marriage, the fulfillment of young love, the promise of our infinity.

You sustained us through the hamburger years. The first apartment furnished in Early Poverty... our first mode of transportation (1955 feet)... the 7-inch TV set we paid on for 36 months.

You wore new, had unused grandparents and more clothes than a Barbie doll. You were the "original model" for unsure parents trying to work the bugs out. You got the strained lamb, open pins and three-hour naps.

You were the beginning.

To the middle child...
I've always loved you the best because you drew the dumb spot in the family and it made you stronger for it.

You cried less, had more patience, wore faded and never in your life did anything "first," but it only made you more special. You are the one we relaxed with and realized a dog could kiss you and you wouldn't get sick. You could cross the street by yourself long before you were old enough to get married, and the world wouldn't come to an end if you went to bed with dirty feet.

You were the continuance.

To the baby...
I've always loved you the best because endings generally are sad and you are such a joy. You readily accepted milk stained bibs. The lower bunk. The cracked baseball bat. The baby book, barren but for a recipe for graham pie crust that someone jammed between the pages.

You are the one we held onto so tightly. For, you see, you are the link with the past that gives a reason to tomorrow. You darken our hair, quicken our steps, square our shoulders, restore our vision, and give us humor that security and maturity can't give us.

When your hairline takes on the shape of Lake Erie and your children tower over you, you will still be "the baby."

You were the culmination.”