1st Sunday of Lent 2022
Deuteronomy 26:4-10; Romans 10:8-13; Luke 4: 1-13
Many many moons ago, I was celebrating the early Mass on the First Sunday of Lent in St. Mary’s, Morecambe, and I posed the rhetorical question “How is Lent going?” To my surprise, a middle aged voice answered from the congregation: “Grand!”
That in itself was grand. If Lent is going well for you, that is a good thing: if you are finding it a struggle, that is good too. If you are not aware of it, if it is having no effect, that is bad; because it is a particularly important time in the year, and in life, and it should be affecting us in one way or another.
Lent is a season of preparation.” Of preparation for what?” you may ask: for Easter certainly, but perhaps more importantly, for the rest of your life, for death, for eternity. Just as, in Advent, we should not rush too quickly to the crib, so in Lent we mustn’t dash yet to the Garden, the Cross, and certainly not to the empty tomb. There is still much work for God to carry out in us before we sing the Hosannas of Palm Sunday.
We are on a journey. The journey of Lent is a microcosm of the journey of life. In Lent, as in life, we have a goal, while at the same time we are recognising the struggles, the opportunities, the sorrows, and the joys of every day. Nor do we make this journey alone. We tread it in company not only with all our brothers and sisters who are alive today throughout the world, but with all who have made that same journey before us.
First among these are our elder brothers and sisters of Israel. As the First Reading reminded us, the Jewish people were commanded to recall the saving work of God among them: their entry into Egypt and their subsequent enslavement, their Exodus from Egypt, and their wilderness journey to the Promised Land.
We are making that journey with them, throughout our lives, and with particular emphasis in Lent. We too have escaped from slavery--in our case, through our baptism—and we too are journeying through the wilderness to the Promised Land. In that wilderness journey, we, like our forefathers of Israel, encounter temptations, failures, setbacks; but we are aware that, like them we are accompanied by God in the pillar and the cloud, the pillar of fire which lights our way, and the cloud of unknowing which hides God from us, but through which we must pass on our journey with and to Him.
From today’s Gospel we see that our Lenten journey and our life’s journey take us through another wilderness, the forty day wilderness of Jesus, which was the immediate postscript to His baptism, and the prelude to His public ministry. Notice that it was the Holy Spirit which led Him into and through the wilderness—Mark, in his Gospel, tells us that the Spirit DROVE Jesus into the wilderness—and it is that same Holy Spirit which leads us into and through the wildernesses of Lent and of life. Incidentally, it strikes me that Lent often brings its own wilderness experiences, regardless of the voluntary penances which we undertake, times of difficulty and struggle which were not part of our personal plan.
Those voluntary penances, however, need to be there. On Ash Wednesday, we heard Jesus say, not “IF you give, IF you pray, IF you fast” but “WHEN you give, WHEN you pray, WHEN you fast”: the manner of these practices is voluntary, the use of them is not.
Often, the fasting element is played down, which I think is a mistake. We are told that we should fast from sin, and that we should do something positive. Of course we should, but that does not take away either Jesus’ words “when you fast”, or His actions, when He fasted during His own wilderness journey. Self denial is every bit as much a part of our wilderness journey as are giving and prayer.
How is Lent going? Ask yourself that question now, and if the answer is that it is making no difference, then shape yourself!
