Lent - soul searching

During the week in my reading my attention was brought to an important subject of bitterness in the heart of people. J S Bonnell said this:

"Whenever one finds an individual who has become a fount of bitterness, taunting and criticising people, saying cruel things that wound the hearts of friends, one may be sure that he is dealing with someone who hates himself, who loathes and despises himself, and that the bitterness manifested by such a person is but the projection of his own contempt for himself."

Lent is a time of soul searching, confession and repentance. May the Holy Spirit search my own heart. I pray that any feeling which is unChristlike be revealed to me. I need His help to get right with God and my fellowmen.

I love the children's hymn which says

"If Jesus Christ was sent
To save us from our sin.
And teach all children to repent,
We should at once begin.

I am coming, Lord,
Coming now to Thee;
Wash me,cleanse me in Thy blood
That flowed on Calvary.

'Tis not enough to say,
We're sorry and repent,
While going on from day to day
On sinful ways still bent.

Repentance is to leave
The sins we loved before,
And show that we in earnest grieve
By doing so no more.

Lord, make us thus sincere.
To watch as well as pray;
However small, however dear,
Take all our sins away. (Ann Gilbert (verses) Lewis Hartsough (chorus)