The Impact of Lent: 2 Areas to Consider

The impact that Lent almost always has on me is that I am challenged by the fact that I live a partial life. What I mean by that is that I know I belong to Jesus. I know he has worked his reconciliation in me. I know, God being my helper, I’m going to heaven when I die, I’m completely forgiven and I belong to him. Nothing can separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus. And, on top of all of that, besides heaven, I actually get to participate in what God is doing in the world, which for me is nothing less than a countless privilege that I’ve never taken for granted.

A Partial Life

And yet I say that I have a partial life, even in the face of all that is great and that has been poured out on me without reservation, because I still really want things to go my way. As silly as it sounds, I really do want, even in the face of the greatness of God, to continue to find my own way. And that’s nothing less than rebellion.

So Lent challenges me not only to face that, but to actually chew on it, to make time for it. Lent challenges me to ponder the extraordinary generosity of God as recorded in Psalm 103: “Who forgives all your iniquity and heals all your diseases. Who redeems your life from the Pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy” (vv. 3-4). No wonder this psalm begins, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless his holy name” (v. 1).

The center point in Lent is, in fact, that we have been invited to actually go even deeper into this extraordinary love of God that has no measure and is always given beyond anything you and I could ever consider deserving. And yet it is that same generosity and challenging love that stands in front of my “I want things to go my way” attitude.

And God looks at me with his piercing generosity and says, “Are you sure?”

A Closed Fist

To quote Proverbs, “There is a way that seems right to a person, but its end is the way of death” (Prov. 14:12). God says, “Are you sure?” That’s the doorway that opens the light in to begin to touch the places where I still live, to quote Nouwen, “with a closed fist instead of with a generous and open hand to God.” It opens the light to allow God’s love to take me into places of sacrifice where I would rather not go. And yet it is through that place that I’m taken into a deeper experience of the love of God, even in the depths of all of the ethat is, in fact, being asked of me – but no different than any of the rest of the sisters and brothers who live on this planet or have gone before us.

In fact, most of what you and I face is a piece of cake in comparison to much of the Christian world. But I’m still invited to chew on it. Lent means giving God the sacrifice of your time to ponder. It’s an invitation to pray, to fast, to make room, in essence, to give your mind the capability to turn off some of those voices enough to go back and reread the Scriptures and discover things you didn’t see before, to think more carefully, as it were, about your life so you have the capacity to be more intentional and live less in fifth gear.

It’s actually easier to live in fifth gear, because that way we don’t have to face our partial lives and closed fists. Lent is a gentle stop to look again, knowing, because God is so kind, that it’s an invitation to experience his own generosity in a deeper way: “You hate nothing that you have made and forgive the sins of all of those who are truly penitent.”

God, that means you need to help me—I don’t know what “truly penitent” actually feels like. I want to let myself off the hook or beat myself up unnecessarily. I don’t know what that center point of penitence is. That’s why even in the New Testament, repentance is a gift. Help me make room, God, to receive that which you want to give.

So I invite you, in the midst of this Lent, to make the time to wrestle with your own partiality and see what God can do. Examine your closed fist and ask the Holy Spirit to help you open it to his redeeming work. So that in a whole new way, as Lent ends and Easter dawns, you may greet with joy the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

What impact do you find Lent making on you? Share this blog and your response on Twitter. Please include my username, @revgregbrewer. 

(This post is an adaption of Bishop Brewer’s sermon on Ash Wednesday, March 6, 2019, in the Bishop’s Oratory of the Diocesan Office, Orlando.)

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.