By Gwen Gustafson-Zook, interim campus pastor
This week’s theme: Me & You & the Creatures Too
Looking out the window from my office on the campus of Goshen College, I am reminded that beauty and struggle go hand and hand. There is something breathtakingly beautiful in the appearance of millions of ice crystals sparkling against the blue sky on a frigid Northern Indiana winter’s day. That same beauty is experienced as pain and struggle when I step out from the warmth of the building and those same crystals sting my cheeks as I try to shield my face from the wind-swept flurry.
This juxtaposition comes to mind as I anticipate Lent, this time when the pain and the struggle and the beauty merge together inviting us all to slow down. To breathe more deeply. To watch with greater attentiveness. And to avail ourselves of the mystery that is revealed to us in the struggle and the pain and the beauty of the Paschal Mystery: Life, death and life again.
These 40+ days leading up to Easter provide a fixed time in which to focus on the mysterious Presence that accompanies us through the pain and the struggle and the beauty revealed to us throughout life: in relationships, in nature, in our very bodies. This year’s theme, “Between You & Me” invites us to explore the subtle dynamics born of spoken and unspoken covenants that make up our lives: Covenants with God, with others, with the earth. Within these covenants, beauty and struggle and pain often go hand in hand, leading us to deeper compassion. Deeper awareness. Deeper love.
We, at Goshen College, invite you to join us in these days of reflection as we share thoughts and observations and stories that can serve as helpful guides as we embark on this Lenten journey.
With eyes wide open,
Gwen Gustafson-Zook
Interim Campus Pastor