From the Pastor
Reflecting on the origins of Lent, preacher and teacher, Barbara Brown Taylor, writes that once Christianity became a more established and accepted religion throughout the Roman Empire, “Little by little, Christians became devoted to their comforts: the soft couch, the flannel sheets, the leg of lamb roasted with rosemary. These things made them feel safe and cared for, if not by God then by themselves. Before long it was very hard to pick them out from the population at large. They no longer distinguished themselves by their bold love for each other. They ceased getting arrested for championing the poor. They blended in. They avoided extremes. They decided to be nice instead of holy. And God moaned out loud.”
And, says Taylor, someone must have heard God’s distress. It was suggested that Christians needed a time, a season, that would call them back to their senses. Israel spent 40 years in the wilderness, Moses spent 40 days listening to God give the law, and Jesus spent his own 40 days of testing in the wilderness. And so the early church announced a season of Lent, a word coming from an old English word meaning spring. Lent, the 40 days before Easter; Lent, a springtime of the soul; Lent, a time for us to look deep into wilderness of our own lives and reflect on what we find there.
Concerning wilderness, Anne Lamott says, “I like it for short periods of time, from inside the car with the windows rolled up and the doors locked. I prefer beach resorts with room service.” She has a point. Venturing into the wilderness, wherever we may find it, is not always a pleasant experience. But my hope would be that for us, the Lenten journey that begins this month might be a time when we are nudged into new understandings of the sacred, a time when we can enter into a 40 day conversation with our daily living, when we dare to ask the question, “How is life with God and me?” May God grant each of us a Lenten journey of growth and holiness.
Gene
