Approaching Easter: Bethany

As I enter this time of prayer, I repeat the words of Psalm 27:4, slowly, several times, making them my prayer to God:

‘One thing I ask from the LORD, this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.’

Pause and repeat

Pause to read the passage: John 12:1–3

‘I hope you have a place like Bethany where you can go when you’re wrestling with unanswered prayer. It could be a place or a book or a piece of music that reminds you of all the good things God has done in the past. It could be a person like Lazarus whose very being makes the presence and power of God real to you even when life is at its worst … Bethany’s the kind of community or the kind of family or the kind of place where you can sometimes still smell the perfume of God’s presence’*

Where is my Bethany? Who is the person in my life that reminds me of God’s goodness? When did I last spend time in that place or with that person?

Pause and reflect

Jesus, I invite You to fill my home with Your fragrance today. Let my whole life testify to the goodness of Your presence.

Pause and pray

As I bring this time with God to a close, I pray a prayer of joyful surrender by Mother Teresa of Calcutta:

‘Dear Jesus, help me to spread your fragrance everywhere I go. Flood my soul with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that my life may only be a radiance of yours. Shine through me and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with may feel your presence in my soul. Let them look up and see no longer me, but only Jesus.’

Amen.

*Pete Greig, God on Mute, David C Cook, (Colorado Springs, 2020), p234-35