WEEK SEVEN LENTEN DEVOTIONAL QUEST CHURCH

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1 WEEK SEVEN LENTEN DEVOTIONAL QUEST CHURCH

2 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. Ephesians 4:32 01

3 Day 37 I will try to keep being compassionate and kind to him as the year continues because God teaches this throughout the Bible. At my school, there is a boy in fifth grade, just like me. I really only see him at recess, where he is one of the least popular kids in the school. He often brags about small achievements without knowing it and often lacks the consideration we show toward the first-graders. However, I know he s just trying to have fun. He doesn t realize he is hard to get along with. So he is occasionally left out of other people s games. I try to play with him, be civil with him, and support him when others overreact to him, and I have found it hard to not lose my cool. I will try to keep being compassionate and kind to him as the year continues because God teaches this throughout the Bible. Is there somebody like this boy in your life that needs to be shown compassion? - Caden Ko (10 years old) 02

4 For this people s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understanding with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them. Matthew 13:15 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekial 36:26 03

5 Day 38 The human body never ceases to amaze me. It is highly adaptable and incredibly resilient, instinctively making the changes necessary to not only survive but thrive. In particular, I marvel at Olympic athletes who consistently push their bodies to the extreme, defying what had been previously understood as the limits of human potential and ability. While we may not necessarily experience the same physical or emotional duress as Olympic athletes do, our bodies both young and old bear evidence of resilience nonetheless. Last year, I was a nanny for a 6-year-old girl and 3-year-old boy from a family at Quest. As an aspiring gymnast, the young girl practiced swinging across the monkey bars every chance she got. At first, she could barely make it across a few bars before giving up, slipping and falling to the ground below. Eventually, she was able to make it all the way across the monkey bars with confidence and ease. One day, after showing off all of her newlylearned tricks on the bars, she walked over to me with her eyes fixed on the palms of her hands. With a very concerned look on her face, she pointed out that something strange was happening rough patches were forming where her fingers met her palms. I told her that those spots were called callouses and reassured her that this hardening was completely natural. I explained that when our bodies endure pain, pressure, tension, or friction in certain areas over long periods of time, they form hard, thick callouses in those areas to protect themselves. Since she was always swinging on bars, her body naturally formed those callouses on her hands as a kind of protection. 04

6 Day 38 The heart is no different. I would argue that our hearts are even more delicate than our physical bodies. We cannot expect to endure a broken friendship or lost loved one, a broken marriage or chronic financial struggle without our hearts being affected in some way. Just as our bodies are resilient, so too are our hearts. They do not easily crumble. Rather, they put up walls and harden their exterior to guard themselves against ever being hurt again. Just as our bodies are resilient, so too are our hearts. Sadly, we often fail to recognize that we emerge on the other side of trial and tribulation with thickened, tougher versions of our hearts. And, we are confused when we have a harder time connecting with people around us. We are baffled when we suddenly struggle to receive love from anyone partners, friends, mentors, family, or even God. We are bewildered when worship, prayer, and church no longer feel the same. We wake up one day and realize that our lives that were once so full and rich are now devoid of love, joy, and anything worthwhile, and we are devastated. I know this all too well. Last year was, by far, one of the hardest seasons of my life. I was struggling to make ends meet by working 45 hours a week, while also juggling four to five classes per quarter as a graduate student at Seattle Pacific. On top of that, I was volunteering at local elementary schools and serving at Quest almost every week. I felt overworked, stretched thin, emotionally drained, and incredibly tired. But, I was also determined to push through and persevere. Little did I know, this warrior-like determination would drastically affect the softness of my heart. With every struggle, setback, disappointment, and rejection, I bottled up my feelings and put up walls to ensure that I would never be hurt again. And it worked. But, it came at a high cost. Slowly, my heart grew numb. I lost intimacy with others and with God. I didn t feel pain, but I also didn t feel love. 05

7 Day 38 Whereas callousness of our physical body is not seen as particularly harmful or destructive, this perspective does not translate to matters of the heart. In Matthew 13, we find Jesus openly condemning those with calloused hearts, just as his Father had condemned the pharaoh and the Egyptians. After all, with a heart of stone, words become weapons. Walls become impenetrable. Chasms are widened. People are abandoned, marginalized, otherized, exploited, and killed. With a calloused heart, we fail to love and be loved. Yet, in the midst of real pain and suffering, callousness is an intrinsic act of self-preservation and an innate and warranted response to the hardships and disappointments in life. The good news is the Lord promises to replace our hearts of stone with hearts of flesh. In the face of adversity, God calls us to choose vulnerability, not denial or indifference. He calls us to acknowledge our hardships and disappointments and to embrace our feelings, not diminish or deny them. He calls us to trust that He is not dismissive or intimidated by our pain and hurt but, instead, is moved by our sorrow. Rather than bandage our wounds and pretend we re okay, He invites us to bring all of our pain to Him. If we desire for our hearts to be soft and tender once again, we must admit that we cannot do it on our own and cry out to the One who brings true healing. We don t need strength to push through. We don t need grit to grin and bear it. We need healing from the One who spoke us into existence, knows us infinitely more than we could ever know ourselves, and chooses to love us as His own. Lord, heal and soften our hearts so we can love like You. Only you know the full extent of my pain, and only you can see the hardened parts of my heart that inhibit my ability to love those around me. Be our protection, guarding us against the rough rubbing of the world so that we may be Your hands and feet to a people in need of Your love. In Jesus Name, Amen. - Megan Motonaga The good news is the Lord promises to replace our hearts of stone with hearts of flesh. 06

8 The next day John [the Baptist] was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, Look, the Lamb of God! When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, What do you want? They said, Rabbi (which means Teacher), where are you staying? Come, he replied, and you will see. John 1:

9 Day 39 Two people had already started on a journey. They had committed themselves to a deeper vision of their life s purpose. John the Baptist was not an ordinary person at all. His two disciples must have heard something in what he said or saw something in how he acted that they wanted more of that they wanted to understand. And when he identified Jesus as greater than he, they began to follow Jesus. I thought the disciples answer to Jesus question, What do you want? was hollow. However, it has taken me several days to decide at least one thing that I want from Him, in addition to His promises. After all the life experiences I have had, I want His presence in my life to help me retain my childlike delight in life! Psalm 51:10 says, Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. What do you want from Him? Jesus answered. Come, he replied, and you will see. I looked up see in the Bible and hit pure gold; long before Jesus, Moses spoke to the Israelites about their inability to see. He even brought ears and hearing into it. He said, Your eyes have seen all that the Lord did in Egypt to Pharaoh and to all his land. With your own eyes you saw those great trials, those miraculous signs, and great wonders, But to this day the Lord has not given you a mind that understands or eyes that see or ears that hear. -Deuteronomy 29:2-4 Matthew, Mark, and Luke also noted that Jesus said, He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. (Matthew 11:15, 13:9, Luke 8:8, Mark 4:9). Ah, yes, with a mind that understands what is seen and heard. 08

10 Day 39 I yearn to be able to see situations with His eyes and hear what is said with His ears so that I understand more nearly what is going on. So, even more, it makes me want to be with Him in His Light because, as Psalm 36:9 says, In [His] light, we see light. I want to suspend my tendency to judge others with my biased eyes, to misunderstand, and, especially, to miss what He wants me to know! I yearn to be able to see situations with His eyes and hear what is said with His ears so that I understand more nearly what is going on. I can think of a time that I completely misunderstood a situation. Can you? Can you think of a time when you got what was happening totally wrong? Were there consequences? Can you recall a doorway in your life that you might not have known was one? - Elder Emerita Barbara Lundquist 09

11 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? My tears have been my food day and night, while people say to me all day long, Where is your God? These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go to the house of God under the protection of the Mighty One with shouts of joy and praise among the festive throng. Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon from Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me. By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God my Rock, Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy? My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, Where is your God? Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. Psalm 42 10

12 Day 40 The phrase absence makes the heart grow fonder, attributed to an anonymous, 16thcentury poem, underscores what is common in the experience of loss. Longing. Loss enables us to see the value of something we have known or had in our lives in ways that we did not fully appreciate until it went missing. Loss and longing are two sides of the same coin. Making contact with one brings us into contact with the other. Lent is a season for remembering the sojourn of Jesus in the wilderness forty days alone, set apart from what he had known to listen, to pray, to respond to the tests and temptations that absence brings. Who is God? Where is God? These are the questions that come in the loss and loneliness of a wilderness experience. Psalm 42 invites us into the prayers of one wandering, struggling, searching, and finding. The honesty of the psalmist s prayer invites us to be honest as well with our own circumstances of loss and longing. It is in these experiences that deep calls to deep. As Henri Nouwen noted, the pain of absence reveals a certain lack of trust in God s love. But God is enough for you. By day the Lord directs his love, at night his song is with me a prayer to the God of my life. In the depths of struggle, we see a shift from the psalmist s focus on his own faith to God s faithfulness to him. We all must make sense of loss and struggle at times, and we often do so on our own terms sometimes even religiously. In the psalmist s prayer, there is a deeper knowing unfolding, one that even the psalmist s own soul struggles to comprehend. Three times the psalmist questions his downcast soul, and three times the psalmist holds hope. We find that in loss there is longing, and in longing for God, we find love and devotion so deep even our very souls struggle to comprehend them. - Jim Furrow We find that in loss there is longing, and in longing for God, we find love and devotion so deep even our very souls struggle to comprehend them. 11

13 LENTEN DEVOTIONAL WRITERS J. Derek McNeil Nancy Rust Michelle Kim Tre Wyatt Sonja Lowe Jonathan Young Ineliz Soto-Fuller Njeri Thande Karen and Kenny Miller Pert Lin Zoë Anderson Pauline Kim Seth Knox La Verne Chen Lindsey Minerva Marilyn Hammersborg Eric Ferrer-Vaughn Cara Meredith Daniel Jung Alicia Choi Chris Fuller Caenisha Warren Helen Chung Deanne Liu Deborah Shepherd Lindsey Gilbert Dorothy Mangale Frank Richard Nate Grossman Roxy Hornbeck Lauren Thomas Nourisha Wells Brian Bantum Theresita Richard Michael Won Erica Anderson Caden Ko Megan Motonaga Barbara Lundquist Jim Furrow COVER PHOTO Jacob Chung EDITOR Maggie Dalzell DESIGNER Matt Lewis 12