The term 'pre-season' is sometimes a season that fans don't look forward to, because the wins and losses don't count yet. Some fans think the preseason is boring and dull, and doesn't have the allure and joys of a regular season. And it's a chance for coaches to work on their plays and rotations, to see who will make the team. However, this is a very important preparation time to get ready for the regular season, for players to get into game shape, to know the plays, and to get back into the discipline of the regular season. However, we know that there would be no season without the pre-season.
This is kind of like the season of Lent. We can't get to Easter unless we go thru Lent. And this preparation time is so important.
We are entering the Lenten season this month, and I wanted to reflect on why this season is so important in our faith walks. It’s not like we jump up and down for joy, and circle this on our calendars like we do with Christmas. Let me explain. Most of us have favorite holiday seasons. For some it's Christmas, with the family get-togethers and presents. For others it's the Fourth of July and summer, filled by a sense of national pride and beach vacations to boot. But each year at just about this time, it strikes me that very few of us would pick Lent, a season that seems to most of us as grim as the weather that usually attends it.
Think about it: crossing off days on the calendar until Ash Wednesday; leaving work just a little early, saying "I've got to get my Lenten shopping done;" advertisements on television saying "only 12 more days 'til the day of Ashes;" or little kids going to bed, asking their parents, "How much longer 'till Lent is here?" It just doesn't happen.
These words don’t jump out at us and scream joy: penitence. sacrifice. contemplation. fasting. atonement. repentance. humility. self-denial. But these are the powerful words that are brought up in the season of Lent.
I mean, even among those traditions that do honor the season, rarely is there the same kind of enthusiasm or expectancy which greets Advent. However, Lent is just as important as the season of Advent. Just maybe I need a time (is 40 days really enough?) to help clear my head of the distractions which any involved life in this world will necessarily bring and re-orient myself towards the Maker of all that was given for my pleasure and which I have let become merely distracting.
Maybe I need the opportunity (and perhaps deep down I crave the chance!) to clear my eyes of the glaze of indifference and apathy which comes from situation after situation where I feel nearly helpless so that I can fasten my eyes once more on the almost unbearable revelation of the God who loves God's children enough to take the form of a man hanging on a tree.
And maybe, just maybe -- and this takes the greatest amount of imagination of them all -- just maybe Lent really isn't mine to do with whatever I please. Maybe Lent is God's. Maybe Lent is God's gift to a people starved for meaning, for courage, for comfort, for life.
If it is, if we can imagine that Lent is not ours at all but is wholly God's, then maybe we'll also begin to recall, at first vaguely but then more strongly, that we, too, are not ours at all, but are wholly God's -- God's own possession and treasure.
Seen this way, Lent reminds us of whose we are. The "sacrifices," the disciplines, these are not intended as good works offered by us to God; rather, they are God's gifts to us to remind us who we are, God's adopted daughters and sons, God's treasure, so priceless that God was willing to go to any length -- or, more appropriately, to any depth -- to tell us that we are loved, that we have value, that we have purpose.
Yes. I need Lent. I need an absence of gifts so that I might acknowledge the Gift. I need a time to be quiet and still, a time to crane my neck and lift my head, straining to hear again what was promised me at Baptism: "You are mine! I love you! I am with you!"
I need Lent, finally, to remind me of who I am -- God's heir and Christ's co-heir -- so that, come Easter, I can rejoice and celebrate with all the joy, all the revelry, all the anticipation, of a true heir to the throne.
And so yes, I need Lent. And to tell you the truth, I suspect that you do, too. You see, we are so busy trying to make or keep or save our lives that we fail to notice that God has already saved us and has already freed us to live with each other and for each other all the rest of our days. And so we have Lent, a gift of the church, the season during which God prepares us to behold God's own great sacrifice for us, with the hope and prayer that, come Good Friday and Easter, we may be immersed once again into God's mercy and perceive more fully God's great love for us and all the world and in this way find the peace and hope and freedom that we so often lack.
I hope we begin to reorient ourselves to the importance and meaning behind Lent. I hope that our children come to Lent with an understanding of the need, want, and reliance upon God, and not the need, want, and reliance upon our own strength and understanding. May Lent be a coming back to Jesus moment for you. May Lent be a time for us to be renewed in the power and spirit of our God. May Lent remind us of the humility and servanthood that our Savior displayed and endured, and may we come out of the season being more like Jesus.
Grace and Peace,
Peter Joseph
P.S. We are excited to announce the birth of Noah Liam Joseph! We feel truly blessed!
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