“When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” is one of the first hymns written in the English language; three hundred years later, it remains one of the finest. Isaac Watts composed and published the text in his groundbreaking 1707 work, Hymns & Spiritual Songs. Because of the emphasis on the cross, it is especially fitting for the…
Good Friday: A Rookie Anglican Guide
Good Friday is the most somber day of the Christian year. On this day, we remember the death of Jesus on the cross. Good Friday? Why do we call the day “Good Friday?” The etymology of Good Friday goes back to Middle English, where “good” had the sense of “holy.” At the time, other days…
The Beautiful Simplicity of Lent
Lent is an opportunity to pare back our overstuffed lives, to return to simplicity and awareness of the Holy Spirit, to share in a small way the sufferings of the saints, and to receive once again the gospel of Christ, who took the entire penalty of our depravity, โmaking peace by the blood of his…
Today in the Spirit: Palm Sunday A
In our walk with Jesus through the liturgical year, Palm Sunday is designed so that we might contemplate Jesusโ entry into Jerusalem and his death on the cross as a unit. Yes, the reading of the Passion or our Lord on Palm Sunday is no doubt an accommodation to the fact that many churchgoers would…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 5A
The designation of Lent 5 as โPassion Sundayโ in the BCP 2019 is a return to that same designation in the BCP 1928 (maybe earlier, but I couldnโt find it elsewhere), where also the two-week period from Lent 5 Sunday through Holy Saturday is called โPassiontide.โ The Collect and readings assigned in Lent 5A continue…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 4A
Lent is a season the church employs to teach that, by the light of the Son of God coming into the world, darkness opposed to the One God is exposed. In these middle weeks of Lent Year A the church assigns long Gospel readings from the Book of John in which there is significant dialogue…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 3A
โIt gives me great pleasure to see the stubbornness of an incorrigible nonconformist warmly acclaimed.โ The Scriptures, contrary to Albert Einstein, understand stubborn disobedience to the word of God to be a non-conformity in which the Almighty takes no pleasure (though he forgives it through Christ!). The readings and Collect assigned for Lent 3 every…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 2A
Having established in Lent 1 that the world into which the Son of God has been revealed is inhospitable to say the least, the church assigns Bible readings in Lent 2 which highlight one critical theater of internal conflict for the believer: faith versus works as the path to fellowship with God. The Collect with…
Today in the Spirit: Lent 1A
In the season of Lent our walk with Jesus just as he walked (1 John 2:6) through the liturgical year takes a turn to face the reality of opposition from the devil and rebellion in the human heart both set like armies gathered in formation against the revelation of the Son of God. If Christmas…
The Liturgical Home: Shrove Tuesday
It’s time for Shrove Tuesday, also called Pancake Day, Mardi Gras, and Carnival. And I’m excited, not only because we will eat pancakes but also because it means we are only a day away from Lent, my favorite season of the year! The End of the Carnival The word Carnival comes from the Latin expression,…