St. Paul’s Family,
This year, Easter falls on one of the earlier days it can occur. For those who want to know, the earliest possible date for Easter is March 22, which won’t happen again until 2285. We should make full use of Lent to examine our lives, seek forgiveness, and draw closer with God. If we make full use of our time during Lent to do this, we find that Easter holds a great deal more meaning to us, rather than just a more celebratory Sunday than others.
I will be the first to acknowledge that during Lent, our lives remain the same. It is easy to continue to get lost in the busy-ness of the world, and just note that we’re still in Lent. In fact, we can get so caught up in life, we tend to neglect our spiritual life altogether. I urge you, with the remaining time we have in Lent to spend more time with God, to see where your secret faults are and how best to address them. Lent can be a very powerful time of renewal of our faith if we allow time for the Holy Spirit to speak to us. Sometimes it’s the little things that can sneak up on us. In my own experience, I have found that if I look back at some of my personal wants/desires, they are fueled by things that are profoundly out of order with my spiritual life. Pride, gluttony, sloth, and other deadly sins can easily sneak in to our lives, even when we think we have the very best intentions. It is hard, at times, for us to see how we may go astray or how we have gone astray by our desire to do good. It is only when we really examine these desires that we can be certain that they are for the truly good intentions that we have or perhaps for some other intention we weren’t aware of when we started out.
I pray that as you start to draw closer to God, that this Easter will greet you with the full power of forgiveness and resurrection that it brings, that all may truly know the power of Jesus Christ over our sins.
Fr. Garland
rector@stpaulsbythelake.org | 512-808-7477
