Welcome to Lent. I guess we don't really "kick off" Lent. We kick off football games and school years. Lent we more mozy into without an ounce of excitement. Nonetheless. Come mozy with me.
Some of you (myself included) will be walking around this evening with a cross of black ashes on your forehead. Some of you, if you're not a Christian, will be wondering why those crazy Christians are walking around with a cross of black ashes on their forehead. Some of you, if you are a Christian, will be wondering why all the crazy Christians are walking around with a cross of black ashes on their foreheads. I've never done the ashes thing before. I've never been in a church tradition liturgical enough to do an Ash Wednesday service. But now I'm a practicing Anglican, so ashes here I come.
Lent is a weird thing. For 46 days (I think that's right; don't quote me), people of faith in Jesus Christ look toward the crucifixion of their Lord. We focus on sin, grief, confession. We spend 46 days in a state of emotional downturn. We stop saying "Alleluia" in church. We remember that we are dust, and that to dust we will return. For a month and half. Is it all really that necessary? Well, I won't say it's necessary. I haven't done it ever before in my 25 years. And I think I've always had a sufficient understanding of Easter. But man, I think it can be hugely beneficial for a lot of reasons; I'll focus on one.
We are people of immediacy. Gone are the days when people pray for one thing for an entire lifetime, much less for more than a few weeks. People throughout the history of Judaeo-Christian faith give us an example that we can never achieve because of our idolatry of Now. Abraham prayed for how many years that he and Sarah could have a kid? Moses never got to see the one thing he spent his entire life pushing for. Solomon saw some great things in his life, got to see and experience one of the few and far between periods of peace and progress in the history of Israel. And he wrote a great book, Proverbs, to set up his son to carry on the greatness for many more years after his death. And what happened? Dude squandered it all. Solomon also left us with Ecclesiastes, documenting his long struggle with feeling like all his efforts in labor were pointless. These faith ancestors of ours were surrounded by the disappointment of working hard for a lifetime and not knowing if it's really worth it all.
Me? When I pray for something starting today, if I don't have it by next week, I move on. That's a clear "No" from God. Simply ridiculous. Selfish. Shallow.
The fact of the matter is that we are all people full of disappointment whose chief aim in life is not to show the world how disappointed and unfulfilled we are. But God responds to our long periods of disappointment, to our lives that often feel wasted, with an offer of eternal fulfillment, joy, and life abundant. We may spend 46 days looking toward the cross with grief in our hearts, but it's so that we can enjoy the resurrection basically until Christmas. An illustration of how pathetic death is compared to life within the gospel of Jesus Christ. A feeble illustration, yes, but it'll do for now.
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I really appreciate this post --- particularly your reflections on immediacy.
ReplyDeleteI would love to hear more about your move to Anglicanism sometime.
Dios le bendiga (God bless!),
Diane
ps. Since every Sunday is a celebration of the resurrection, it doesn't count in the liturgical "40 days" of Lent. Some people use that as a reason to not follow their Lenten discipline on Sundays (this is especially helpful if your discipline is something like "I give up showering" --- not so helpful if your discipline is "don't watch Sunday afternoon sports").
Thanks Diane. Yeah, Anglicanism is not terribly far removed from Methodism. Definitely similar in a lot of ways and from the same roots.
ReplyDeleteI have learned that about Lenten Sundays from my Catholic-raised wife. I once looked at liturgical worship as "Spirit-less." Totally not true.