Sunday Stretch: Vol. 69

Start off your week with a grounded take on Bible, prayer, the world, and your life ...

Hi Readers,

Welcome to the First Sunday in the season of Lent. In case you missed it, I shared a video this past week for Ash Wednesday, focusing on the fact that Lent began on Valentine’s Day this year, and how it reminds us of the coexistence of Love and Truth. I hope you get a chance to check it out. I’ll be sharing brief weekly videos every Wednesday through the season of Lent (the 40 days, excluding Sundays, prior to Easter in the Church Year).

The word Lent comes to us from the Middle English for “spring.” And as I think about the season of Lent beginning again, I’m reminded that spring is (usually) a dirty, muddy season here in the Upper Midwest. The predominant color of early spring is not green but brown, as dormant grass lies in wait, and tree branches have yet to bud. Even in the midst of this exceedingly mild winter, spring in Minnesota will be muddy and mucky and likely even a little bit snowy (maybe?!) before we get to blooming pink and verdant spring, and to Easter.

On Ash Wednesday, we receive the sign of the Cross on our foreheads, and we hear these words: Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

If you add water to dust, and add in a little more organic matter, you get mud. Mud is dirty and slow and sticky. Lent, and life, can feel like that sometimes. But it is in this muck that life begins anew, not by denying the muck but by engaging it and living through the midst of it. That’s my hope for all of us this season, as we draw near to Cross.

Let’s get to the texts …

Noah and the Rainbow, by Marc Chagall

Bible Stories

Gen. 9:8-17

Gen. 9:8   Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, ⁹ “As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, ¹⁰ and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark.^{a  11} I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.” ¹² God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: ¹³ I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. ¹⁴ When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, ¹⁵ I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. ¹⁶ When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” ¹⁷ God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.”

There are a few stories of covenants in the Hebrew Bible, including a covenant with Abraham that establishes