Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the Lenten Season in our churches. It serves as our own personal time to prepare for the death and resurrection of Christ. A time for our hearts to prepare to mourn and then to rejoice on that third day. To prepare for Judas to kiss Christ in betrayal. To prepare for the trial as the people screamed for Jesus' crucifixion. To prepare for the death of the Son of Man. To prepare for Mary to find the empty tomb.

Lent is probably my favorite time of year in the church. Advent and Christmas are close second and third, but Lent is just, something special. As I walk through the forty days and seven Sundays that come as I prepare for the death and resurrection my life seems to change a little. The way I look at things. They way I think about certain things. My attitude itself changes.

I see this season as my time to wander for forty days and forty nights. Just as Christ wandered, I want to wander as well. I want to take this time to reconnect my relationship with God because I know it gets damaged throughout the year. I long for the forty days and nights in which I can prepare for the death and resurrection of my Savior because with his rising on Easter morning I rise as well.

I want to stress that it is not only on Easter morning that we rise with Christ in his resurrection, but it is every morning when we wake. Every morning you have the opportunity to rise with Christ. It's just hard sometimes to remember in the midst of our busy lives. Lent is the time in which we are forced to focus on it. It's a time when we actually recognize it. And a time for us to gather our thoughts from the year before.

As we go throughout this Lenten Season it will be a different one for me. One in which I'm not only reflecting on my own life and relationship, but the life and the relationship of my church as well. Ways for me to give back to the church that gives so much to me. I do a lot already, but sometimes it just feels like I'm going through the motions.

May this season be a time of reflection for you. May this season be one in which you can wander and reconnect your relationship with God. And may you use this time to prepare for the rising of the Son of Man.