Sometimes I think we as Christians miss the mark on the reality of Lent. Not always with impure intentions, but rather simply because we have fallen into what the world has shown us this season means. And how easy it is! When Mardi Gras and Moon Pies surround you and the threat of beach season right around the corner, it’s tempting to slip into giving up a vice that may help us detox or shape up to put our best foot forward in the coming days. And while these such things are wonderful to relinquish control of – there must be something more to simply “giving up” something if we are to really experience what this journey of the Lenten season is really all about.
The word “lent” comes from the old English word for spring and was meant to mirror the Jewish Passover. Lent consists of 40 days. There’s something significant about that number 40. The 40 day period mirrors the 40 days Moses spent on Mt. Sinai. It also mirrors the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness. The Church recognized the need for shadowing these times in Scripture in order to remember the divine narrative leading up to the Cross. We start with Ash Wednesday, marking our foreheads with a symbol of the cross from the ashes of the previous year’s palm fronds, and preparing the way for the journey to the cross. By the time Palm Sunday comes around, we are celebrate the coming King, ushering Him in with palm fronds and singing His praise and welcoming Holy Week with a bang. The week pinnacles with Good Friday, which is anything but, and the silent mourning of the crucifixion and he darkness of the night. But then comes Easter Sunday, when the love story of God is completed with the tomb empty and our Savior risen. What a journey indeed!
This journey is meant to be a time of fasting and prayer. Of cleansing and filling. Of centering our lives to Him. Every fast and feast in the Church for the past 2,000 some odd years has been given to the whole body to remind us that Christ’s actions affect us, even now. They are spiritual seasons, reminding us that our sins are forgiven, death is abolished and Christ is risen, even now. Our repentance leads to God filling us with more of Himself when we fast with the intention of receiving instead of just giving.
It’s also important to remember in times of fasting, such as Lent, that we’re not just “giving something up,” but we’re “giving something over”. What use is forsaking yourself of something that has little or no control over you? We come to realize, the less we take, the more we can give. Christians have long viewed Lent also as a time for alms-giving (the practice of giving to the poor and needy) as well. So, when we think of Lent, we ought to think of service and pouring out love into the brokenness of the world, so that the world can know the riches of the love of God. You see, it’s not about what we give up to make ourselves better in some way, it’s about letting go of what controls us and handing it over so that we may be free to serve others in compassion and mercy, extending His love – the very love that led Him to the cross for us – to everyone around us.
