This Lent, without actually planning to, I have been in a process of reconciliation with myself.

After years of neglect I began going through a stack of journals I’ve kept since 1970. It’s been a humbling and revelatory experience.  When I began I thought it would be a simple exercise in ripping and shredding. But then I would start to read something I wrote many years ago and it was like I was catching the light from an ancient star just now arriving and catching my attention for the first time.

Humbling because I recognize the same person addressing and struggling with the same issues decade by decade. It seems my life has been progressing in spirals rather than in straight lines. Continue reading Lenten Reflection from Palmer Maxwell: Reconciliation with Myself →

God of grace and glory,
I come into your presence in this holy season,
aware of my brokenness,
confessing how easy it is to make idols of earthly things.
For this I repent.
I seek to set aside all that separates me from you.
I want to risk forgiving others and to find my own
forgiveness in the fullness of your mercy.

Help me to hear and to see.
Help me to live in the blessed assurance of faith,
without illusion.
Knowing I am forgiven.
Knowing I have work to do.
Knowing that through you I dwell in grace and freedom
even when I struggle to feel it.

I thank you for life and breath this day.
I lift this vast, beautiful, and broken world up to you
as I praise your holy name.

Amen.

“This is a favorite reflection of mine – I received it at a mission some time ago. It comes from Vincentian Parish Missions.” -Carmen

Disturb us, Lord,
when we move through life,
without really living it;
when our dreams have come true
because we have dreamed too little;
when we arrived safely
because we sailed too close to shore.

Disturb us, Lord,
when with the abundance
of the things we possess,
we have lost our thirst
for the Water of Life.

Fill us, Lord, with your Spirit
of Wonder and Greatness.
Stir us to live more boldly;
to venture on wider seas
where storms will show your mastery;
where losing sight of land,
we shall find the stars.

We ask you to
expand the horizons of our hopes;
inspire our dreams
and move us into the future
with courage, imagination and trust.