[From ACT3 Weekly E-mail, February 18, 2008]
Why Lent?
February 18, 2008
John H. Armstrong
My own spiritual tradition never mentioned the season of Lent. My first recollection of Lent was, therefore, quite negative. I remember Catholics getting ashes on their forehead on a Wednesday (there weren't many Catholics where I grew up in the 1950s) and I thought in my simple mind that these very confused people were just showing their piety off in public. My second thought, formed a few years later, was that Lent was a time to abstain from something you enjoyed (ice cream, chocolate, hamburgers, etc.) so that you could help add something to your good works in the hope that you would get into heaven when you died. Even when I entered the ministry, and remained a pastor for twenty years, I never thought about participating in Lent. It was, put simply, foreign territory for my spiritual life.
All this changed a few years ago, especially when I began to read ancient and classical Christian theology and inquire into the reasons why Christian tradition had developed seasons like Lent on the Church calendar. Then I participated in my first Ash Wednesday service (in a Lutheran context) and shared in Lenten observance with understanding. Now it has come to mean a great deal to me.
Lent?
One popular evangelical theologian defines Lent as "a time of abstinence, prayer and works of charity." This simplistic definition is accurate, to a point, but it merely reinforces the common evangelical mistakes about Lent in the process.
Lent is the forty day period (excluding Sundays) following Ash Wednesday and ending with the celebration of the Church on Easter eve. The forty days are a reflection of the forty days our Lord faced temptation in order to prepare for his great work of ministry and sacrifice. This is why Matthew 4:1-11 is often connected, and why I used it in my own Ash Wednesday sermon this year. (We also recall that both Moses and Elijah fasted for forty days.)
Lent is a season of preparation more than anything else. We are preparing for the greatest celebration of them all-Easter. In the early days of the Church, Lent was a time of preparation for baptism and remains such in the East down to the present day. Protestants have tended to use it more as a time for study, personal and congregational worship and deepening their own repentance.
The first formal mention of forty days in association with Lent came in the Canons of Nicea in A. D. 325. though in the West the actual time was not finally determined until as late as the seventh century. One prominent early Church father, Irenaeus, said that fasting should not exceed two or three days during Lent. Certain ascetic and rigid practices about fasting did develop fairly early. For example, a common practice was to eat only one meal a day, late in the day. Meat, fish and even eggs were not eaten in many sections of the Church. Only centuries later was a great deal of this relaxed in the West. In the East some of it is retained to this day.
In the Western Church the penitential aspect of Lent is reflected in the various aspects of the liturgy, such as in the use of purple vestments and the omission of the Alleluia. Today the emphasis is more on abstaining from ecclesial festivities, by the giving of alms and by the devotion of more time to spiritual growth and development. Following the Protestant Reformation, and in reaction to fasts being abused, much of this fell away, though Lutherans and Anglicans held on to the core of the practice and do so to this day. Increasingly, I find younger Christians asking questions about the practice and longing to know more about it. In emerging Western Church settings there has been some recovery of the idea and practice, though this is in no way universal.
But Is it Biblical?
Most evangelicals want to know, "What is the biblical basis for things like Lent?" The answer is not simple, and a simple response misses the point, at least to my mind.
If it is biblical, and it is, to fast, to repent, to seek God, to pray and develop my spiritual life intentionally, then surely Lent can be used toward this end even if we are not commanded to keep it. So there is no compelling reason to not keep Lent in the New Testament.
I would argue that asking the question this way is actually not the right way to ask the biblical question. Once you read the tradition, with any degree of respect for historical development and Early Church practice, you soon discover that there is a wealth of common practice among early Christians that is not only worth retaining but extremely valuable for one's spiritual growth.
The apostle Paul warns us about human regulations and celebrations that are not to be used to judge one another. He writes:
Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ (Colossians 2:16-17).
But this text has often been misunderstood by evangelicals, who seem to think all Church celebration, rooted in Church tradition, are wrong. What Paul is really saying here is that man-centered superstitious ritualism is deadly. Mystical experiences, in and of themselves, are not even wrong. They are, however, dangerous since they can lead to pride, deception and schism.
What Paul says elsewhere, very plainly, is that true Christian worship centers in the living Christ (cf. 1 Corinthians 11-14) present with his gathered congregation, speaking to his flock and culminating in communion with them in the Eucharist. This is so obvious that even the most radical Reformers understood this very clearly.
Ascetic Practice
Ascetic practices are not wrong either. In fact, they are taught by God. Matthew 6 makes this very plain-fasting, prayer and almsgiving-when it declares certain practices to be normative for followers of Jesus.
The correct idea behind ascetic practice is found in the New Testament word, askéō, to exercise. It is used only in Acts 24:16: "I exercise (strive) or exert myself to keep my conscience clear before God and all people." The term was used by ancient Greeks to tame the passions, to exercise virtue and thought control. Philo found in Jacob (Genesis 32:24ff.) the model for this practice and later Church fathers like Clement and Origen adopted this usage. The idea is found, without the word, in 1 Corinthians 9:25ff where the term askeín resembles the self-discipline of an athlete in training. Though the word is not used, there is a parallel text, for sure, in 1 Timothy 4:7-8. Thus the early Church developed the idea of askēsis, or "exercise, practice or training."
Over time the Church developed three types of theology-moral, mystical and ascetical. Ascetical theology dealt with the so-called "ordinary" ways of Christian perfection, or maturity. Insofar as grace would allow us to perfect the fear of God and the love of Christ, this theology treated the means employed and the dangers to be avoided along the way. If there is a goal to be reached, namely to become more and more like Christ, then how am I to pursue it?
It is at this point that I have to bear witness to the power of all of this kind of thinking, and living, in my own life. I was taught that to try to be like Jesus was impossible and all I needed to do was rest in his grace. In one sense this is, of course, profoundly true. In another it is a dangerous error. I was also taught to grow as a Christian, though this was pretty optional and advised for those who really wanted to be fruitful. But then I asked, "What then should I do now that I am a Christian?" The answer was rather simple-pray, read the Bible and attend church to get fellowship and teaching. Eventually I learned about keeping "a quiet time" and thus about regular daily Bible reading. But after these disciplines the well went dry. This is precisely where things like Lent came into my journey with great power. These disciplines, used with care and not as empty human traditions (which they are not since they were developed over centuries by thoughtful and serious Christians), provided me with a way to pursue my Savior's heart and to draw closer and closer to him. I am so far away still but I feel I am making progress I never knew for many, many years.
Lent This Year
Brennan Manning writes: "You see, the older I get, the more I ask myself, 'How is my life unfolding in terms of my primary goal of living with God forever?'" This is what has been dominant in my Lenten reflections this year. My regret is that it took me so long to see this picture of how my life was unfolding before God. It didn't need to be this way, I am now convinced. I don't blame my evangelicalism for this, but I do not think it helped me at this point either.
Lent, this year, is forcing me to take this question to heart on a day-to-day basis. If my goal is to be more like Christ, thus to see him and be satisfied with him, and him be satisfied with me, then this is the question to be asking right now.
What does Lent have to do with this question you ask? Well, it takes me out of my routines and raises all the right questions on an annual basis. There is an admonition that goes this way: "A Lent missed is a year lost from the spiritual life." I do not fully believe that, but I understand why it is stated that way now that I understand Lent better.
Emilie Griffin, in her new Lenten book, Small Surrenders (Paraclete Press: Brewster, Massachusetts, 2008) states this better than I can when she writes:
Lent has been marked out by the church as a time to ask oneself the big questions: What am I doing with my time? What am I doing with my life? How well am I expressing the imprint of Christ upon my heart? How deep is my charity? How deep is my love? How devoted is my service? How is my life unfolding in terms of my primary goal of living with God forever" (22)?
Griffin's title captures it for me. As an evangelical I was taught that there was really one great surrender, the one when I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior. Then there was a "second surrender" when I came into a deeper life of total commitment, or something like that. But "small surrenders" were not part of my framework. I think what I missed was huge now. "Lent," says Griffin, "is a time of benchmarks."
I find Lent to be a very evangelical experience. It reminds me that what I am, what I am becoming, is what allows me to become a "little Christ" and thus to become an expression of his life to others. Am I full of hope? Do I rejoice in suffering? Do I care about the needs in the lives of those around me?
Lent is coming to the question, intentionally and annually: "How am I doing?" An accurate answer will often elude us since sin blinds us even to ourselves. This is where spiritual friendship, godly counsel and the season of Lent all come to our aid. Authentic friendship and a non-showy pursuit of spiritual formation and personal transformation is what it is all about. Ideally, we all ask these questions throughout the entire year. Lent is, however, a wonderful reminder that we can use this forty day journey to intensify the question, thus we can pursue more directly more "small surrenders."
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