I gave up coffee for Lent.
....and then the world flung upside down.
The coronavirus entered our news feeds and our psyches. As we read and watched and wondered, it entered our country and our cities and our local communities. As it continues to wreak its havoc on the health and safety of everyone around the globe, we watch and we wait and we wonder and we pray. And we wash our hands and we stay home. We listen to what we should be doing {or not doing} to somehow slow the spread of this awful, deadly illness.
And I honestly don't know what else to do.
There's something about the quarantining and the social distancing happening over Lent that is somehow oddly holy in the midst of all that feels incredibly unjust right now; and I am trying to figure out what to do with that.
And after multiple fitful nights of sleep and early morning wake ups just to get some headway through the work of the day before the house wakes up, I went back on my Lenten vow and brewed the coffee.
And it was good.
And as I sit here with the coffee to my left and this tension in my heart about the practices of Lent and the holiness of this time and the unjust world that keeps revealing its brokenness, my heart is heavy. My spirit is tired. I need to turn off the news but I crave information. I crave preparedness. It's at the core of my being.
I need to unplug from social media but that's where I am feeling most connected these days. It's also where my anxiety increases as I read the news articles and step into the lives of others who are making the most of their days with kitchen organizations, homemade science experiments, and hands-on learning activities while I can barely get it together to put real pants on.
And I don't know where to find the balance.
And I imagine what Jesus felt going away for 40 days where he was tempted and tested. And I think about how we are all being tested right now. How our country, how our society, how our communities and our families are being tested. And right now Lent {for me} is not about giving up that one thing or continuing to give up that one thing. Right now, everything about where we are is completely unknown and unchartered.
We are in the wilderness.
And we won't be out of the wilderness by Easter. April 12th may be a "beautiful time" on the Christian calendar, but it will not be a healthy time for us to celebrate en masse. We are going to have to continue our walk through the wilderness even in our celebrations, even as we find beauty in the ashes, even as we know that a more joyous time of gathering is indeed coming. And, yes, I do believe that beautiful and celebratory time is coming.
This walk through the wildnerness is not what I had planned in my Lenten practice this year. I imagined these 40 days as a time of reflection, of {minor} sacrifice, of going through the daily and weekly routines of life remembering Jesus' sacrifice and His gift of magnificent grace. I imagined a holy celebration with people I love on Easter Sunday morning, of a family photo at the foot of the cross in our sanctuary, of a backyard egg hunt, and a table full of comfort food and the faces of loved ones.
But even through this walk, through the uncertainty and the unknown, I do know that life continues. The paths may meander and enter periods of darkness, but sunlight and growth and water still find their way through the trees. We are all walking these meandering paths together--perhaps in different step--but indeed together.
Every wildnerness has a path out. We will find the path out. And when we do, we will turn our faces towards the sun.
And we will embrace one another.
And we will shake each others hands.
And we will dance in the streets.
And we will shout with joy that the resurrection has come.
Our world will be different. We will be different. Our time will be marked by what was before and what comes after.
Perhaps that is the hope that gets us through one more day.
Alleluia. He is coming.
