Lent 2022

Jason Myers Blog

This coming Sunday, March 6th, will be the first our first Sunday of the Lenten season for 2022.  Lent is the 40-day season of reflecting and re-focusing on the suffering and sacrifice of Christ leading up to and preparing for our observance of Good Friday and celebration of Christ’s glorious resurrection on Easter Sunday.

As a way of helping you to reflect, refocus, and prepare yourselves (and others) on Christ during this Lenten season, here are a few resources for intentionally and beneficially observing Lent:

These short but profound reflections from David Mathis, author of The Christmas We Didn’t Expect, will help you to look deeper at Jesus’ life, sacrificial death and spectacular resurrection–enabling you to treasure anew who Jesus is and what he has done for us.

Many of us are so familiar with the Easter story that it becomes easy to miss subtle details and difficult to really enjoy its meaning. This book will help you to pause and marvel at Jesus, whose now-glorified wounds are a sign of his unfailing love and the decisive victory that he has won:

“He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:5)

This book works fantastically as a devotional at any time of year. The chapters on Holy Week make it especially helpful during the Lent season and at Easter.

  • To Seek and Save, by Sinclair Ferguson — This short devotional book takes you week by week, day by day through the Lenten season.  Here is a short video trailer for the book and a brief description by the publisher:

“As you walk through the second half of Luke’s Gospel, you’ll meet the people Jesus encountered on the way to the cross and prepare your heart to appreciate his death and resurrection afresh.
Each day you’ll be invited to read a passage of Luke’s Gospel and a short meditation by Sinclair Ferguson, reflect on a thought-provoking question, respond in prayer and praise.
Pithy yet profound, these devotions will hold up a mirror to your own heart and, more importantly, give you a window into the heart of the Lord Jesus the one who came to seek and to save the lost at Easter.”

  • Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross, by Nancy Guthrie (Editor) — Here is a brief description of the book by the publisher:This collection of readings, drawn from the writings and sermons of 25 classic and contemporary theologians and Bible teachers, focuses on the wonder of Christ’s sacrifice.In a culture where crosses have become little more than decorative accessories and jewelry, how easy it is for even the most well-intended Christian to rush from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday without thoughtfully contemplating the cross and all that it means. Yet we miss out on spiritual riches when we do.So that we all may linger at the cross during the Lenten season—and stay near it the whole year through—editor Nancy Guthrie has compiled this special anthology. It draws from the works and sermons of classic theologians such as Luther, Edwards, Spurgeon, Ryle, and Augustine, and from leading contemporary communicators such as John Piper, R. C. Sproul, Francis Schaeffer, John MacArthur, Skip Ryan, and Joni Eareckson Tada to help readers enter into an experience of Christ’s passion and anchor their hope in the power of his resurrection.Each essay in this collection holds to a high view of Scripture and expounds on a particular aspect of the Easter story using the appropriate Scripture passage from the ESV Bible. These readings are sure to prepare people’s hearts for a fresh experience of the cross each and every Easter season.
  • Happily Ever After, by Jonty Allcock — This is a very small evangelistic book to give to your family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, or whoever.  Here is a short video trailer for the book and a brief description of it by the publisher:

We all long for “happily ever afters”. But let’s face it, life’s just not like that! Or is it?

This evangelistic book takes readers through the Easter story. Good Friday looked like a bad ending to Jesus’ story. But Easter Sunday changed everything…for everyone…for ever after!

Readers will discover how Jesus’ happy ending can be theirs too as they explore how his life, death and resurrection solve the big issues that plague humankind–sin and death.

Easter really can change your life, for good, for ever after!

This book is great to give away to non-believers at Easter.

(If you do give away this book to an unbeliever, please be sure to:

    • Read it yourself, first.
    • Pray for them (that they’ll accept the book, read the book, and that the Holy Spirit will work through it).
    • Commit to following up with them after a few weeks.
    • Invite them to attend our Good Friday and/or Easter worship gatherings.)