Lent has become a really important time in my life. I appreciate the wisdom of the Church Fathers and Mothers who looked at life and realized we needed a yearly season of slowing down. I was taking part in a meeting with other Pastors and worship leaders at the beginning of our lenten season and I posed a question: What is it your hoping to get out of Lent this year? It was a question I was sure everyone would have some kind of answer for and I was hoping to hear some inspiration from the group. One Pastor shared that he was thankful for the timing of Lent and was excited that it was offering him a time to “pray as he should all year long.” He went on to explain that prayer is part of his daily interaction with God, but that during Lent he prays differently – deeper – more real.
As I listened to his words, I felt an ache in my own soul. There have been several times in my life when I had that deep prayer kind of life. Sometimes it was real churchy kind of prayer – the whole going to the altar and kneeling thing – and it meant a lot. Other times my prayer life took on the whole talking out loud while I was driving kind of approach. I remember one day praying in my car and as I looked over to the car next to me the man looked genuinely scared – guess he was worried about the guy talking to himself. Other times, my prayer times have been quiet and reflective – no words at all, just silence. While at other times, the prayers have been songs – either other peoples or my own made up on the spot.
That’s the beauty of prayer – it’s not a script or a pattern. When Jesus taught us to pray he wasn’t teaching a verbatim. He was teaching a mode of the heart. The prayer Jesus was encouraging us with was the prayer that invites us to live in the moment – to abide with God right then and there. It was a personal prayer not some royal address, but a family conversation. Words matter, but what matters more was the intent and the heart that was seeking to encounter and be changed by God’s presence.
This past week I started re-thinking about my friends statement and my own lenten journey. I realized that my pursuit of a holy lent was a little bipolar. I was studying and immersing myself into the final moments of Jesus’ life and his journey to the cross, but I felt distracted and hurried. Much of that hurry is just life, but some of it was far more sinister. I felt my soul drying out and my mind becoming clouded. I think of it like toast that’s been in the toaster a bit too long – it’s dry and it takes a lot of butter to be able to choke it down. I didn’t like what I was feeling. I didn’t like that this Lenten Journey of mine was feeling so split up inside of me.
I decided to start up a social media fast. I use Facebook and Twitter on a daily basis. They are tools for me, but they can also be a huge source of distraction. I sat one morning reading and realizing that the content in front of me was directly adding to the dryness of my soul. I wasn’t feeling encouraged but was getting more discouraged. I was surrounded by negative images and posts. I felt like I was being attacked. Now, I’m not saying social media is the source of evil – it’s just a tool by which that evil is transmitted, but for me I felt that my lenten journey was stalled out because of it. My 40 days of pilgrimage had gone 5 feet forward and 10 feet back for too many days.
So I decided to exit from the information superhighway for a while. I’ve been checking direct messages and notifications, but I’m not reading all the posts. I even deleted some of my twitter follows – not that they were bad, but the folks commenting on them weren’t healthy. Then instead of spending that time seeing into the abyss of human frustration, I began nurturing my soul. I began returning to practices that gave life. I reached out to old friends and began praying for them again. I began to realize how selfish my life had become – I was living in a very me-centric fashion – it was very convicting. I picked up an old book by a man who struggled with similar challenges and let his encouragement bring grace to my parched heart.
When I decided on the social media fast I was concerned. How would I stay connected? How would I get news? But after several days now, I’ve not fallen into some disconnected whole. But instead of mourning what I’m not seeing, I’m seeing real life things again. I’m seeing what really matters. The distractions are falling away. The water in my tank is far less cloudy. I feel like I’m not just bobbing around and trying to keep up, but I feel like I’m restoring.
As we approach Holy Week, I would like to invite you to take time to unplug. Maybe your soul is just fine and you don’t need to step aside, but I would bet that more of us need it than we realize. Maybe social media isn’t your area to unplug from – maybe it’s TV or talk radio or something else. Only you know what it is that distracts and dries out your soul, but whatever it is; can you let it go? Can you take the next week and embrace slowing down and feeding your soul? It may be spending time in silence, or reading spiritual classic, or just listening to something that brings you to worship – but whatever it is that feeds you soul, take big bites this next week. I invite you to join me in soaking our souls in all that is bright and beautiful and life giving. Who knows, maybe with letting things go, we’ll find resurrection as we finally arrive at Easter.
I pray that you will experience a very blessed and holy passion week. May you truly be filled to full with all our loving God has for you. May you encounter anew God’s beautiful…GRACE and PEACE.
