February 14th as well as being Valentines Day will be Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Lent and Easter are early this year (Easter Day is on March 31st) It seems incredible that it doesn’t seem that long ago we were taking our Christmas trees down and now we are thinking about Lent and preparations for Easter.
When we think of Lent, words like “sacrifice,” “discipline,” and “self-denial” are often used in ways that suggest that Lent is something to be endured rather than a time of grace and spiritual growth.
People think about fasting in some form, giving up chocolate, alcohol and puddings, some refrain from taking sugar in their tea or coffee. Personally, I find these small sacrifices quite superficial. For me Lent is about making God a priority in our lives once again, a time to focus on our relationship with God, I see Lent as a ‘spiritual spring clean.’ Rather than giving things up, maybe we could consider ‘taking up’, spending more time in prayer, contemplation, and bible study.
Have you ever thought of Lent as a yearly second chance? Each year the Church gives us six weeks to take a long, loving look at our lives to see if our values and priorities are in line with God’s desires for us. Since most of us find that we’ve wandered from God’s path, Lent becomes that second chance, a spiritual getting back to basics, to “return to God with our whole heart.”
Lent gives us a season to perhaps distance ourselves from all that distracts us from time spent with God. It is so easy to pick up our phone and engage with social media, binge watch television, and browse Amazon for the latest consumerist deals. Maybe in Lent we can give time to reflect on those negative habits and attitudes we have that may include criticism, pessimism, and those grudges that we hold onto, that damage our relationship with other people and ultimately our God. Lent is a season that gives us an opportunity to step back from the distractions that get in the way of a healthy spiritual life, and our relationship with our Heavenly Father. One writer has suggested that “It is the time to dedicate ourselves to a healthy ecology of the heart, to cleanse it.”
The Christian writer N.T. wrote “Lent is a time for discipline, for confession, for honesty, not because God is mean or fault- finding or finger-pointing but because he wants us to know the joy of being cleaned out, ready for all the good things he now has in store.”
- Fast-from hurtful words… and say kind words.
- Fast from sadness… and be filled with gratitude.
- Fast from anger… and be filled with patience.
- Fast from worries… and have trust in God.
- Fast from bitterness…and fill your hearts with joy.
- Fast from pressures… and be prayerful.
- Fast from pessimism… and be filled with hope.
- Fast from grudges… and be reconciled.
- Fast from selfishness… and be compassionate to others.
- Fast from words… and be silent so you can listen.
Every blessing,
Rev Jeanette
