Weekly Reflection

 

March 8th to 14th

Lent 3

Draw near – praying

 

Readings: Isaiah 55:6-11, Hebrews 10:19-26

 

6 Seek the Lord while he may be found;

    call on him while he is near.

7 Let the wicked forsake their ways

    and the unrighteous their thoughts.

Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them,

    and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

    neither are your ways my ways,”

declares the Lord.

9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth,

    so are my ways higher than your ways

    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

10 As the rain and the snow

    come down from heaven,

and do not return to it

    without watering the earth

and making it bud and flourish,

    so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth:

    It will not return to me empty,

but will accomplish what I desire

    and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

 

19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

 

The Church of England's official Lent theme for 2026 is called ”Draw Near” and is based on James 4:8, “Come near to God and he will come near to you”.  It is a set of spiritual disciplines to cover the 6 Sundays of Lent, and for this week I have chosen one of them about Praying.

 

Isaiah 55:6 tells us to “seek the Lord while He may be found”, saying that there is a level of urgency about this command.  Let us not put it off.  Procrastination is notoriously known as the thief of time, and in practice tomorrow will be equally busy.  Verses 10 and 11 state that God sends out His Word (aka Jesus) with a purpose to be accomplished; the start of Matthew 25 makes it clear that procrastinating could lose us the ultimate goal of life with Jesus. God’s time for each one of us is NOW; however we must always remember that despite the previous statement, God is not in a hurry, he just needs us to be ready when He calls.

 

Hebrews 10:22 is sometimes used in the Communion service at the Invitation as the people are invited to draw near with faith to receive the bread and wine.

 

Living the Christian life is broadly a matter of drawing near to God; our most important activity is to pray, and if we can pray from the heart and be led in our praying by the Holy Spirit, we will find that we can be in close communion (small c) with God.  If we continue this pattern regularly we will almost certainly discover that He is also drawing near to us.  We will hopefully also find that we start to hear from Him as well.  In recent years I have been blessed with the Gift of Prophecy, but this did not happen overnight; 30 or 40 years ago I was regarded by my then church leaders as someone who “hears from God”.  Hearing Words from God has recently become for me a full Spiritual Gift, but in my case it took 30-odd years!  I now simply have to be ready to hear Him.

 

Our other vital activity is to study the Word of God.  This is not the place to go into detail about the different versions of the Bible and their appropriate usage, I have written about this elsewhere[1].

 

Reading our Bible each day (or more frequently if our lifestyle and time permit) should be a regular activity for any Christian.  There are at least two levels of doing this: a cursory reading to absorb the general gist of the narrative, and a detailed verse-by-verse study to understand in more detail what the passage is actually saying, both to its original readers and to us today[2].

 

We can read the same passage more than once at different times and phases in our Christian walk, and each time find something new and inspiring to draw from it.  We have a very generous God; let us worship Him in spirit and in truth.

 

Heavenly Father, we thank you that you have given us the richness of your Word, both in printed form and in the example of Jesus’ life.  Give us grace, Lord, always to draw near to Him and listen to Him and follow His teaching.  Give us repentant hearts when we fail (especially now during Lent) and enfold us in your loving arms so that we can move forward.  In the Name of Jesus. Amen.

 

 

[1] If you are interested in this topic you can find details in my e-book, “The Holy Spirit in your Life”, Chapter 2; you can find it here: https://www.charismata25.org/hsiyl.html#_Toc194687055

 

[2] These aspects are detailed theological studies amd are largely the preacher’s task, but if you are interested you can look up exegesis amd hermeneutics to see how this process works.