1st Sunday of Lent
Photo by Kevin Lee on Unsplash
Dear Self,
Are you happy?
You have a stable job. You eat at least three times a day. You have friends who support you, a family who loves you and a partner who adores you. You even have a community that prays with you, and for you. Despite the many problems and challenges that life brings, it’s been a comfortable life.
And so, are you happy?
It seems like you’re not. You sense that something is missing. Or you are just looking for something more. Despite the many blessings surrounding you, there is always that temptation to feel unfulfilled, to be lacking, and to think you are unloved. The temptation to get a better job that pays more. The temptation to eat at popular restaurants. The temptation to be liked by everyone and to please everyone.
You don’t have to be driven out to the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. The devil can tempt you wherever you are – not only when you are alone and desperate, but also even when you are happy and comfortable.
Since Lent is a time of self-reflection and self-denial, use this season to reflect on the temptations of wanting more in your life and to rely on God to resist these temptations. Look forward to emerging from your desert renewed, transformed, grown in your faith and happy.
Love,
Me
Ash Wednesday
Photo by Jan Canty on Unsplash
Dear friend,
Here we are at Ash Wednesday Mass. We will hear the same readings, even more, hear the same call to repent, fast and give alms. I know you want to do these and more. I want too. Together, let’s make this Lent count, not waste its grace for conversion.
You asked, “How can I get nearer to God this Lent?” By coming to God as we are and hearing Him tell us our true identity.
Recently two good friends and I conversed about the hard times of pains and losses we’ve had these past months. We witnessed vulnerably to each other’s wounds and wonders. We held one another in that honest, palpable love and care friends share.
Isn’t this how we’re to relate to God in Lent? To honestly acknowledge our mortality, our frailty, failure, and limitation. To let Him meet us as we are and change our lives for better.
We can because God is steadfast in love and infinite in mercy. This is why He will listen with tender compassion to us who are in the ashes of sin. Then, He will speak that raw, unvarnished truth of who we really are to Him – His beloved.
St Mark tells us Jesus went into the wilderness after God said: “You are my beloved with whom I am well pleased.” We too are God’s beloved. Let’s not just settle into Lent with this same truth; let’s let it draw us to our conversion in God.