It is predictable as ashes on the first day of Lent; by the
second week, I’m discouraged. Usually, I’ve learned that my plans weren’t at
all reasonable and I have to fine-tune them. Usually, I’m dismayed by my
inability to hit all the points of prayer and alms and fasting in a seamless
way. Lent at this point is exactly what I need: a stark reminder that
conversion takes time and patience and perseverance. Still, it somehow
surprises me that I am completely unable to undergo the conversion I want for
this season within the first week and that it’s not yet time for the Easter
celebration.
Lent is long. That’s a good thing. We begin with the enthusiasm
of a season stretching before us full of promise, and as it lengthens, we can
see the wisdom of that extended string of days. We have time for introspection
and soul-searching. We have time to reach out with repentance and forgiveness.
Lent is also a time of waiting. We wait with Jesus in the desert.
If we can be patient and stop ourselves from running ahead of Him and barreling
through the season on fire with grandiose self-help ideas, He’ll meet us where
we are. And He’ll show us where He wants us to go. That might not be where we
want to go. A good Lent is rarely without surprises. Be patient. There is
beauty in the wait.
That desert experience is vulnerable — there’s nowhere to hide
out there in the barren stretch of desolate landscape. Lent is most fruitful
when we’re willing to bare ourselves to our Lord, to invite Him into the places
we hide from the world — the dank, dirty paces that we fill with shame. If we
our vulnerable, He will transform them.
Vulnerability is more than inviting someone into my house when I
know there’s laundry piled on the living room couch. It’s more than taking and
posting a selfie without makeup. Vulnerability is even more than admitting I
don’t have it all together. Vulnerability is admitting I’m afraid that I will
never have it all together, that I will never know the questions, never mind
the answers. True vulnerability — the kind we can only have if we are
completely authentic with God Himself — takes me to the places that I’m afraid
are broken beyond repair, too broken even for the Creator and Savior.
Vulnerability invites God into my shame.
It’s in the wilderness of that Lenten desert that God will speak
into shame. Sometimes, I’m like Gomer, who kept running and running as if she
could outpace the Lord. He didn’t give up. Instead, He said, “therefore I am
now going to allure her; I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly
to her. There I will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will
respond as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt.”
(Hos 2:13-16)
Lent holds open the door of hope. Can I respond with childlike
faith, secure in the love of my Father and without all reservations of both
pride and shame? Instead of looking at Lent as a six-week crash course on
self-improvement or the impetus to reform my diet, can I see it as time with
Jesus in the wilderness, discovering the best of what He hopes for me?
Foss, whose website is
takeupandread.org, is a freelance writer from Northern Virginia.