I’ve always found Lent is an uncomfortable time for me. Lent speaks to me the way no other season in the church does because it calls us all to account, to be transformed!
Just before I left Auckland, I was invited to dinner with a group of friends and afterwards we watched a re-run of the movie, “Driving Miss Daisy.” For those of you who have seen this film, you will know that it tells more than a story of the relationship between a black chauffeur and an elderly, rich Jewish widow. It is the story about the challenge to be transformed in mind and heart. Lent is a season when the church calls us to reflect on our lives and to ask God how our lives need to be transformed into a stronger relationship with Him. The popular and familiar passage from John’s Gospel 3:1-17 challenges us, like Nicodemus, to be transformed to Christ.
For Nicodemus, the transformation is his understanding of the significance and truth of Jesus’ message. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.” For us, our transformation begins when we ask God for his forgiveness for the wrong we have done in our lives and ask his Son, Jesus Christ to come into our lives through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s called being “born again,” not physically, but spiritually.
Miss Daisy had to be converted, to be transformed. Her attitude toward the loss of independence needed to be changed. This did not happen overnight; rather the process she experienced was absolutely necessary for her to eventually be able to say to her chauffeur, “Hoke, you are my best friend.”
As our Lenten journey continues, let us look into our hearts, as Miss Daisy was forced to do, and ask the difficult questions; “What needs to be transformed in my life? Do I know God in my head or have I invited him through Jesus, into my heart? Does he have lordship over my life or do I only allow him into certain parts of my life? ”
I pray that we will have the courage to answer these questions truthfully for when we are able to do that then we will be able to go forward courageously to seek new beginnings in attitude, personal conduct and, most importantly, in faith. May we as Christians be transformed to Christ, the One who died to set us free and who, one day will bring us eternal life.
Yours in Christ,
Jinny.
