What is Lent really about?

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday, the start of Lent. Lent is the season of the church year that prepares the faithful for Easter. Some might ask, what kind of preparation could someone possibly need for the celebration of new life? Easter is joyous after all. It’s full of life. Yes, but…that’s only part of the story.

As I have said many times before, you have to go through death in order to get to resurrection. Our tendency is to want to skip over the death part. Death is pretty uncomfortable in many ways. It’s not fun. It’s painful. It’s full of sadness for many. We’d rather not think about it. Lots of people don’t even plan for it. Here’s the thing, everyone will experience death at some point. Death is a part of the cycle of life.

There are many who consider Lent a time of self-reflection. An opportunity to quiet oneself, assess where we are in life and how we are living into the faith we have been given. It’s a time to ask yourself — What needs to die in my life? What is in way of faithfulness? What beliefs, identities, and parts of my life have been put on a pedestal that I look at to make decisions, rather than God?

Lent is counter cultural in some ways. Our culture tells us we can have anything we want, when we want. We don’t have to wait and we are right for wanting what we want. Our culture is focused on how we can consume information, ideas, identities, and of course stuff. All of this is accompanied by a message that is constantly fed to us that says that we are incomplete, not enough, lacking. Amazing how…