Forty days in the desert can be a really long time.
We fast from something during Lent for forty days because Jesus fasted forty days in the desert, and every year, our reasons for doing it vary. Some of us fast because it’s just what we do – it’s expected of us, or we always have. Some of us fast because we’ve never done it before, and we wonder what this is like. Some of us start a fast, and then realize our goals were aggressive and maybe we should have thought/prayed this one thru a little better. And some of us start – and then stop – and then start again. Because grace.
When I decided to give up coffee for Lent, I knew it would be hard. I also knew it would be really good for my character. Self-denial shapes us like nothing else. I love coffee – not just the flavor and the smell and the sound of it brewing – but the warmth of the cup between my hands, and the habit of it… the constancy of a cup of coffee just sitting there next to my computer, the symbol and the means towards a break in whatever business (or busyness) occupies my time – however brief that break may be – one swallow’s worth of a pause, or the one minute trek to the pot for a refill. Tea just doesn’t do the same thing for me. Tea is work and it gets cold, and you can’t refill it, unless you’ve made it the real way, which is work. Coffee is effortless, and somehow more substantial.
So I guess in a way, giving up coffee is a good way to Lent – giving up ease for something a little more work, something harder, something not quite the same. Lent is work, it’s hard, and it’s a season unlike any other.
And sometimes, like certain seasons of life – or like winter in most of the USA this year – it feels long, and cold, and sad.
I woke up feeling incredibly sad today. As I’ve prayed throughout the day, I’ve finally begun to understand why – but it doesn’t matter, really, the root of it at all – what matters is that the sadness is real. And that like Lent, or the desert, the only way through it is one foot in front of the other, continuing on. Eyes on the end goal: Easter is coming. Remember that mourning will become dancing. Say the Kaddish; you will see His kingdom come and coming.
I knew as the loneliness and the sadness rose this morning, in spite of my attempts to quell them, that I was not alone. But it did not feel that way. And many of those to whom I would usually turn seemed so far out of reach. We are busy, in this Lenten desert season. My inner circle has so much going on. It is teeming with life – with people falling in love, getting engaged, and supporting each other in ways that count. It is also teeming with the other stuff of life – jobs and homes lost, futures uncertain, questions unanswered, heavy workloads, limited time, and hard choices. I am making some hard choices myself – to not be there in all the ways I would wish for the people I love most because I am one person and I can only carry so much – and I am trying not to feel too guilty about it. Somewhere along the way I read Paul’s words about being all things to all people, and forgot that it was about the gospel, and not about being superhuman. And that he did not mean we should drive ourselves into the ground, only that we should try to find common ground to relate to people so they would find the gospel winsome. It is okay to not be everything all my friends need in this season, and it is okay for them to not be there, too.
But it is hard, when they are not. It is hard when what I need most is time spent with someone who does not expect anything from me, who does not need something in this moment or in five, who would maybe just want – of their own volition, without being asked – to spend time with me, doing nothing, just talking, being, watching the stars, or taking a walk. And it is hard when I do not have time for those things either.
But if I have learned nothing else from Anne Lamott (and I have learned much), it is that self-care is not selfish. And while I cannot do anything about my schedule or anyone else’s, nor heal my own heart, what I can do is to take care of me. I can pay attention to the state of my heart, and respond in ways that will promote levity instead of despair. When I am aware of my sorrow and choose to embrace it, owning its causes and stepping thru it with Jesus – in time, I will again find myself in joy. It is not easy – but it is not complicated. It is the way of simple felicity: happiness, joy, favored circumstances – they are right there. Sometimes it just takes awhile – a journey of sorts – to see what is already there.
I gave up coffee for Lent because it would be good for my character, and a good character is the companion of a healthy soul. It was a form of self-care, that choice. But today my soul needed comfort and hope, not discipline and asceticism. I already know that comfort comes from the One who created the coffee bean, and not from coffee itself. I do not need the discipline to teach me that. I chose it, to remind myself.
Caring for myself today meant letting go of my pride – choosing not to care if anyone thought it was weakness to “give in” and make a pot of coffee. I don’t know, maybe it was. But I made that pot of coffee in celebration of the fact that this long cold desert winter of emotion, of Lent isn’t going to be here forever. That God-with-us is with me. That Easter is coming – and joy is just around the corner. And that I don’t need to do anything to earn God’s favor. Because grace.
photo courtesy of ©DepositPhotos.com / Zoooom
“See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; He will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” – Revelation 21:3-4 (NRSV)
That is the promise. It is that for which we wait, with expectation, through these long cold days of Lent, through the darkness of Good Friday, and through the deeper darkness of Holy Saturday. Sometimes the darkness seems very dark indeed – but “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:5 – NIVUK)
