Beginning Lent

Beginning Lent
“Blessed are the poor in S/spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”
Lent is the season when the church says “Stop!” We are all so addicted to hurry in our 24/7 wired and connected world that it might better be said, “Unplug!” And once unplugged, Lent advises us to “count the cost” of our participation, willed or not, in a world that moves at such a pace seeking an ever elusive “Holy Grail” of we know not quite what. Among the costs, we might well discover, the emptiness of which Jesus’ Beatitude speaks. And in such discovery, Lent truly begins for us.
In our hurried quest for whatever it is we think (or are told) we seek, we grow blind to the pace and grace of the ordinary. We forget God’s expressed desire to be “Immanuel,” God with us, God in human flesh, Jesus of Nazareth. We buy the illusion that the important, the significant, the meaningful are never where we are, rather, they exist, if at all, somewhere else and are accessed by something other than our ordinary, day-in-and-day-out lives. Thus we seek, especially in Lent, to find some new means to hurry to the end of the rainbow. There, so we believe, an intrepid seeker can find a pot full of spiritual benefits.
So some of us give up something for Lent; others add some kind of spiritual discipline. Some take on a “Forty Day” program of renewal and enrichment for Lent. Others attend regular and special worship services more often. Many go on some kind of retreat or conference. What is common is all these responses to Lent is that all involve doing something or going somewhere different than we do in the normal course of life.
Consider this Hasidic tale (as told by John Westerhoff in A Pilgrim People, 74):

“A poor Jew named Isaac lived in a hovel far from the city. One night Isaac dreamed that if he made a long difficult journey to a far-off place he would find a bag of gold underneath a bridge leading to the main gate. It seemed foolish, but he made his way painfully and slowly to that place. He arrived weary, hungry, tired and sore, and found the bridge heavily guarded. Forlorn, he told the guard of his dream, but the guard only laughed. “You old fool! Only last night I had a dream that if I were to journey to a small village, I would find a treasure behind the fireplace in the miserable home of an old Jew named Isaac. Be off, old man!” Isaac made his way home and so at last found the treasure.”

Where will your Lenten “treasure” be found this year?