Lent begins tomorrow - an opportunity for a closer walk

The glow of the tabernacle holding Jesus...   A desert awaits us - Lent begins tomorrow with Ash Wednesday services!  Following the 40 days that Jesus spent in the desert after his Baptism and before his ministry began.  I am very excited at the thought, and would love to get away form it all for 40 days!  Yet, the craziness of life continues around us, and we are called to find that desert place within us with prayer, fasting, and alms giving.  This is an especially difficult time to find peace here on the farm with calving going on.  Night is interrupted by getting up every 2 hours and watching the cows on cow TV to see if any are calving.  Last night we heard a cow literally scream over and over.  Pat jumped out of bed and reported that it wasn't the pains of giving birth that caused her to bellow like that, but the sight of her new calf!  Such excitement at the sight!  Pat had to get dressed and go out to put them in a pen together away from the others.  I tend to lay awake praying "Hail Marys" while he is out there - that there will be no disaster awaiting him and the phone will ring with bad news or an order to get out there right away.  Thankfully, that wasn't the case last night.  All in all calving just adds to the sense of anxiety, along with all the other things life brings to us.  Although a desert is kind of hot, dry, and pokey with the cactus and snakes and scorpions - not a super get away place... I have a vivid picture of Southwest deserts after driving through the boring desolate landscape for days on our trip to and from Texas... There is an emptiness, and quietness, and sameness to the desert that really appeals when life gets all tied in knots and dragged down by all the distractions and darkness that comes in the door with sin and failings.  I want to say with St Peter this day to Jesus - "We have given up everything and followed You."  Mark 10: 28

The Crucifix we added to our bland sanctuary probably about 5 years ago really becomes a focal point as Lent is set to begin tomorrow!  The newly remodeled interior of our Church has added to the beauty of it hanging before the star filled sky! 
May we truly give it all to Jesus - our jobs, our family, our farm life, our spouse, our lands and material posssessions, our health, our happiness, our addictions, our sins and weaknesses, our happiness, our wish for this or that to be different, our parents, our siblings and extended family... give to Him the entire package that is us... the good and the bad.  I do need to get to reconciliation soon, and leave behind the sin that has crept into my life.  From there I can begin distancing myself from all the things that are holding onto me.  May I truly work at ridding myself of those habits that are not good for me - not allowing me to Be holy!  Lent is the time of year to put those out of our daily life, and then to do more for others monetarily as well as by deeds!  There is much offered for us at our local church here in Marshall!  There is the stations of the Cross on Friday nights as well as Adoration on both Tuesdays and Thursdays through the day, and times for confessions, there is also a Mission beginning this weekend.  Here is the bulletin on line for this week - http://pilot.holy-redeemer.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/03-02Bulletin-PRNT1.pdf 

Cow TV has changed our lives for the better!  One TV show that will not be shut off for Lent!
That is something we would do with the kids - call our TV provider and turn off TV for Lent!  I missed watching the news as I made supper the most, but we would set out board games on the coffee table and the kids loved that!  They would get so excited to see the checker board out and the mancala stones and board.  Scrabble would also be played and last Lent John and I started playing Words with Friends on Facebook!  It was so great for me to have that connection with him at seminary and I here at home... it brought the two of us back to the Lents of more family time playing games and no TV!   This year I might sneak a look at the 5:30p news and then no other TV other than cow TV!   I now play about 10 games of Word with John - it has grown from our game last year!  Now I will be playing with John as he lives with Fr Craig Timmerman in Canby and helps him around the parish!  It seems like a good fit for John now as he, once again, discerns his call and comes to grips with what the Lord is asking of him.  It was good to see him for a few days, but we all know that he needs to keep busy with things that keep him from dwelling too much on himself, yet we also feel that he needs to work on some inner healings as a result of the cancer battle!  Jesus, I want to say with St Peter this day - "We have given up everything and followed You."  I place it all at your feet and Trust!

Jesus, you promised us that if we give our all to you that we will be "receive a hundred times more in this present age: houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and eternal life in the age to come."  You would add that "persecutions" in there, Lord!  I look at our daughter, Little Sister Hallel, who is a member of the Community of the Lamb - http://www.theleaven.com/V31/v31n22lamb.html  I just found this article about the building of the little monastery in Kansas City and there stands my Hallel in the photo!  Such a gift!  I started to share that Hallel has given up all and we see the Truth of the what Christ says to us in how she is blessed with all those things she has given up in her Community and those she meets and touches as Christ knocking on the door when she goes out on Missions of begging for her food from the poor!  She carries with her the Gospel she has "chewed" and taken into herself to share with all those she comes in contact with!  http://catholicdefense.blogspot.com/2013/09/little-monastery-bright-light.html  Another article I just found about the life and little monastery in KC!

Hallel falls on her knees before Jesus, her spouse!  http://www.communautedelagneau.org/little-monastery-lumen-christi/?lang=en  The official website for the Community of the Lamb!
Jesus, help me to die to self this Lent and allow the dryness and hunger of the desert show me that I am weak and need You always.  Jesus, I trust in YOU.  Amen and Hallelujah

Bless-bless, Barbara Luke
"I have 5 kids and in June 2012 one of them, Simone, who is eleven, was diagnosed with lymphoma.  We entrusted our family to the Virgin Mary... Right from the first signs of my son's illness, seeing him defenseless and bedridden, it became clear that his existence and well-being did not depend on me; he is not mine, he belonged to Another.
The certainty that it is the Lord who makes all things, including myself, doesn't spare me form struggling and worrying.  Nonetheless, it makes me glad for everything that happens, because I feel embraced and supported by Him.  Every instant that I live is an opportunity to say 'yes' to him who makes me...  God doesn't want anything bad for me - of this I am certain - and what the Lord takes away, he gives back, increased a hundredfold .  Indeed I see the hundredfold happening one drop at a time, because Simone's cancer has been, and still is, on a daily basis, an opportunity to be more serious about everything, with a desire for the meaning of everything that happens to me...
Father Julian Carron said, 'Circumstances good of bad - all of them - are ways through which the Mystery calls us.  They are not, as we so often interpret them according to our measure,... Burdens that we must put up with.  They have a very specific purpose in God's design.'  The purpose is certainly my daily conversion.  If my tendency to sweat the small stuff makes my day a little opaque, the Lord gives me something to make me look up, give thanks, and surrender to him...  Nothing happens by chance.  For me,... recognizing Christ within this trial has allowed us to keep walking through this valley of tears and has made everything mysteriously simple."  From a letter to the editor of Traces magazine
I can relate to this very much... the mysteriously simple part is that it takes all that is distracting and needless away and we get down to what matters in LIFE/LOVE/LIGHT - Faith and Family!

Hanging out in Kansas City - the hundredfold return for giving up Hallel?  It means that these little ones with the rest of their family will have the amazing lives and family of the Community of the Lamb always in their lives - showing them how to give all to HIM and find a well of LOVE overflowing into their lives and their desert within! 

Casting Crowns - Come to the well