Our 2024 LENTEN Meditation Journey . . .

During Lent, we pray . . . “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” – Psalm 51:11. Prayer is powerful, and when we pray for each other, we truly are working together for lasting change.

The meditations focus on embracing this new heart, this new life in Christ, and looking deep within ourselves and acting in ways that seek and serve Christ in others. Our 2024 meditations follow the schedule of Scripture readings from the lectionarypage.net, which includes both the Revised Common Lectionary for Sundays and feast days and the daily eucharistic readings.

Father, if the prophet had commended you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? – 2 Kings 5:13b

In today’s reading from 2 Kings, we meet Naaman, a foreign commander who suffered from leprosy. Through his wife’s Israeli servant, Naaman learns of Elisha the prophet and seeks a cure for his lifelong disease. The cure Elisha eventually offers is disconcertingly simple: he instructs Naaman to wash in the Jordan seven times so as to be healed.

Rather than welcome this news, Naaman is enraged by the simplicity of Elisha’s instructions. He was expecting a task as allencompassing and consuming as his disease. His servants point out the irony in this, saying “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it?” Naaman’s healing comes about in part because he sets aside his expectations and accepts the simplicity of Elisha’s instructions.

I think this is just the message we need for this moment in Lent. For some, Lent is a time of profound sacrifice, fervent prayer and selfexamination—and this is certainly appropriate. The way of the cross is serious work, and Lent is a time of living more deeply into that. And yet we are also following the One who said “my yoke is easy and my burden is light” and whose life and witness was marked by penitence but also feasting and joy. Sometimes healing can come through the simplest paths.

Do we sometimes make the journey more complicated than it needs to be? How might embracing simplicity and trusting in God’s guidance lead us to healing and a deeper
connection with the way of the cross?

TODAY’S READINGS
Psalm 42:1–7 | 2 Kings 5:1–15b | Luke 4:23–30 

Episcopal Relief & Development is the compassionate response of The Episcopal Church to human suffering in the world. Hearing God’s call to seek and serve Christ in all persons and to respect the dignity of every human being, Episcopal Relief & Development serves to bring together the generosity of Episcopalians and others with the needs of the world.

This Lenten Meditation Journey is provided courtesy of Episcopal Relief & Development and was authored by Miguel Escobar. He is an Episcopal Relief & Development Board member and the Director of Strategy & Operations at the Episcopal Divinity School in New York City, NY.