Beginning the season of Lent each year – usually with at least a little trepidation – I tend to think about it entirely in terms of preparation.
And certainly this is true. I am not, after all, fully ready to receive the graces of Easter. I need to pray and sacrifice so that I can participate more authentically in the celebration of Christ’s resurrection. We all need time in the desert to remind ourselves of what’s important and to prepare our hearts for the Lord, and this part of the liturgical year embodies that need. As the Body of Christ, in fact, it’s a way for the Church herself to experience a time of penance and prayer leading up to the Triduum: the death, burial, and resurrection we come to share through Our Bridegroom and Lord.
But this year the readings on Ash Wednesday reminded me that our preparation is also more than a period of penitential waiting. In his second letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul writes:
“We appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. For he says: ‘In an acceptable time I heard you, and on the day of salvation I helped you.’ Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.”
Behold. It is a word that asks us to stop what we’re doing and look. Right now. It is a word that expresses presence, rather than the anticipation we might expect. Now is the day of salvation.
Because we are creatures bound in time, living out our stories within its limitations and gifts, it’s hard to grasp the now-and-not-yet of God’s promise and presence. But Scripture reminds us – and our Sunday moments of yearlong Easter emphasize – that the time of salvation is always now. Even our penance and our Lenten preparation participate in the glory of Easter. Every effort to draw nearer to God by His grace – that is, every effort to allow Him nearer to our hearts – participates both in the suffering and in the resurrection.
May we find joy in our sacrifices, our small sufferings, by knowing that these – though real and necessary – are never cut off from the light and the peace for which we long. God’s love holds all things together and makes all things new. May we trust this, even when we cannot see it. And may we one day know this fully in the eternal Easter of heaven.
God bless you on your Lenten journey!
