Time to Fast, Pray, and Return to Jesus

I believe it is not accidental, or coincidental, that this Lenten season comes to us at this moment of history–rather it is providential.

Yesterday, on Ash Wednesday, millions of Christians in the United States and around the world had ashes imposed on our foreheads. This marks the first day of Lent, a time of fasting, prayer, reflection, and repentance– all to prepare ourselves for Easter.

My daily devotional yesterday morning said this:

In the Bible, ashes symbolize mortality (Genesis 3:19) are used to express grief (Isaiah 61:3) and are also a sign of repentance (Luke 10:33). At the beginning of Lent, some church traditions burn palms used in the previous year’s Palm Sunday celebration and use the ash to mark on the forehead of members of their congregation. This reminds them of their mortality and prompts them to examine their hearts and get right with God.

I believe it is not accidental, or coincidental, that this Lenten season comes to us at this moment of history–rather it is providential.

In a new administration that has become a new regime, a historical crisis of democracy is moving fast and furiously. Political chaos has deliberately replaced government competence and efficiency. The chaos agents are eliminating any kind of accountability to executive power and shattering the lives of millions of long-time federal workers through quick and cruel dismissals.

In particular, the brutal cruelty against the poorest and most vulnerable people in the United States of America and around the world is at the core of the Trump agenda. That is not just a political issue, but a gospel issue for many of us across the political spectrum. To attack the “least of these,” whom Jesus told us to protect, is anti-Christian and anti-Christ. In what Bible introductions and commentaries call “the final judgement of the nations,” Jesus also delivered his final test of discipleship for all who would call themselves his followers.

Listen to our podcast today about the immediate consequences of the virtual destruction of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Millions will starve and millions will die, including pregnant women and their babies, without necessary vaccinations to save their lives. These deliberate actions by a hypocritical Trump administration, aided and abetted by the majority of Republican leadership, is not pro-life, it is anti-life. Comprising only a fraction of one percent of the U.S. budget, these actions have negligible impact on the magnitude of federal spending.

The mass deportation of undocumented immigrants already includes massive numbers of innocent people who have absolutely no criminal records or have been ever convicted of a crime. In response, during his recent State of the Union Speech, Trump asks again for more.

The Republicans in Congress have now passed a budget bill which will necessitate the massive cutting of Medicaid for those who most need help for their health care, and SNAP and other food programs for the almost 50 million hungry people–mostly children and seniors–-who live among us unsure of when or where their next meal will be. Just today NBC reported that a new report from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says that “Republicans can't meet their own budget target without cutting Medicare or Medicaid”.

Jesus said, it was me. “I was hungry.” America now makes poor families and children risk hunger and death, in Africa and globally with the demise of USAID, and in the United States by slashing food programs.

Jesus said, “I was sick.” The Trump/Musk regime plans to cut life or death healthcare around the world. They are looting hundreds of billions of dollars from food aid and healthcare depriving those who need it most in the U.S., imperiling millions of American lives.

Jesus said, “I was a stranger.” The government is now targeting and devastating the families who have obeyed the law for their whole lives in America and currently generate $1.6 trillion in annual economic activity according to the American Immigration Council.

In response to the assault of the Trump Administration on our neighbors, over 100 national faith leaders have sent out a Lenten letter which calls us to Return to Jesus during this Holy Season. Please read, sign, and spread the letter, calling us all to protect each of the most vulnerable and at-risk people whom Jesus instructs us to protect.

More than just policy differences or political arguments, our obedience to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is at stake here.

Underneath all the above cruelty lies the relentless mouthing of falsehoods; lies that are so overwhelming, that no fact checking of Trump’s speeches is able to bring us back to truth. Jesus said, “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” Jesus reveals how this government’s systematic destruction of the truth will lead to the loss of our freedom and our democracy.

America no longer has a president or moral leader. A practiced and savvy showman, who is also a deeply flawed and amoral human being, now seeks to rapidly and recklessly sacrifice our democracy at the altar of own wealth and power, attended by his billionaire acolytes.

We must pray, fast, repent, and reflect upon how we can return to Jesus.

It is time to gather courageous circles of fellow believers and reach out to people of conscience beyond our churches.

It is time for faith communities during Lent to pray for the courage to stand up and speak out.

It is time for pastors, in this providential Lenten season, to find the courage to bring these gospel matters into our churches and prepare to take our churches out into the streets.

It is time for Christians to show up at growing public gatherings to raise up the teachings of Jesus.

It is time to mobilize and organize with pastors and church leaders helping to lead the way in their local communities.

It is time to resist the power of Mammon, the allure of material wealth.,

It is time for people to align our purchases with our purposes by boycotting goods and services from mega corporations who are bending the knee to the Trump Administration.

It is time to pray daily for the court’s to uphold the law against a lawless president.

It is time to pray for the courage of Congressional leaders–of both parties–to break from a disturbed and dangerous leader who used fear to win an election and now unchecked power to cudgel his opponents.

It is time to bring our liturgical season of Lent into our historical crisis, right now, and bear the cost of doing so, Lord, have mercy.