to lent or not to lent

Over the years, I have vacillated wildly in my observation of Lent or, depending on denomination, forty days of consecration. Very few Lent seasons have ended in triumph, where I step away from a stronghold and focus on Jesus. Most have begun with good intentions only to derail into a spiritually flippant gesture of at least I tried.

The past couple of years and, if I were to be honest, most of my fortieth decade, have been a hard season of loss and the discovery of something more valuable that I did not realize how much I needed. It has been more of Jesus, but also more of me, in the best and worst of ways. It’s blinding scales falling off my eyes revealing the reality of now while still running some days and limping others toward a felt hope. And it has included my insistence on clinging to earthly strongholds that so easily entrap all my good intentions with the desires of my flesh.

So, I sit at the feet of another Lenten mountain and feel my soul wanting to wander into a desert moment. To decrease. To learn. To break a stronghold or two while admitting my brokenness. To stop and be with Jesus while being quiet to what the Spirt wants to teach me.