Comment by Harborough churches: Lent is meant to be hard but also a time of spiritual refreshment, revelation and new possibilities

Viewpoint by Janet Smith, Chair of Churches Together in Harborough

Recently I was watching amazing film footage of Bactrian camels in the Gobi Desert in the depths of winter, having to eat snow, their sole source of moisture, in temperatures as low as minus 40 degrees. It perfectly demonstrated the inhospitable nature of a wilderness landscape. The producer of this episode of the BBC’s Perfect Planet commented that the desert was unlike anywhere he had ever been on Earth.

In the Bible, the desert is a special place, described by Jenny Phillips as, “an in between place where ordinary life is suspended, identity shifts, and new possibilities emerge.” A week into Lent, and many Christians the world over are using this 40-day lead up to Easter to contemplate their own faith journey, while reflecting upon Jesus’ own wilderness experience. It was a time of tempting, a place of silence and prayer, and a backdrop against which He prepared Himself to begin His public ministry and mission following His baptism.

In the mid-1980s and on my first teaching practice, I asked eleven year olds to write short statements on what different Christian festivals meant to them. Two responses remain with me to this day in their description of Lent. For one student, Lent was a time for “lending things like pens, pencils and sweets”; for another, Lent was all about, “pain, willpower, sacrifice and the devil”. On the face of it, these were two different levels of response, yet they sum up for me what this time of year is all about for Christians.

Yes, traditionally it is about “giving up” things – making sacrifices as we remember Jesus’ own spiritual desert battle. However, in more recent times Lent has also become about giving back and being generous – asking what we can do for others.

What we may choose to do will be different for each of us. Perhaps we can use this time before Easter to take up and establish new habits, like regularly volunteering our time to help in our local community, de-cluttering and giving away all those things we do not need, buying goods that bear the Fairtrade mark (this week is the first of Fairtrade Fortnight), or making one lifestyle change that we know will benefit planet Earth.

For the camera crew sent to first find and then film the camels, it was a difficult assignment, but then in the words of the producer, “finding the camels was worth it,” and such a special experience. Likewise, for Christians, observing Lent is meant to be hard, and we will all at times have gone through our own “wilderness experiences”. But it can be also be a unique time of spiritual refreshment, revelation, and new possibilities for the faith journey. And well worth the effort!

Janet Smith is Chair of Churches Together in Harborough