Thankful for Lent

Blurry, but happy: I was invited to run a stall at a women’s Lenten retreat recently at St Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney.

We’ve hit that time in Lent when you’re either powering along with a renewed spiritual life, or flagging with disappointment at how poorly you’ve kept your commitments. Or perhaps a bit of both!

A few weeks ago, a young mum at my parish shared with me how one Lent had changed her life.

While a student at uni, she decided to give up complaining. Completely. And she very soon realized how pretty much all her interactions with friends were based on whingeing about something. Faced with one negative conversation after another, she had to sit there and say nothing. It was like a lightbulb going off, that simultaneously powered her in a new direction. She didn’t need to tell me how much this had changed her attitude. I could see it in her eyes. For her, that Lent breathed new life.

But even when we don’t measure up to our hopes, God is listening.

I remember a Lent about 10 years ago when I was living on my parents’ farm. It was one of the first Lents when I decided not to just try to cut out the bad habits, but to take something up. I committed to taking up writing four or five times a week, and drawing three or four times a week.

“But even when we don’t measure up to our hopes, God is listening.”

Looking back, I think I was trying to express a sense that God had made me for something that I wasn’t really living.

Now, it wasn’t a life-changing Lent in that I failed miserably and wrote and drew very little. But God was listening. He knows our weaknesses – and fear of failure, and a lack of self-worth are far more serious issues than a proclivity for chocolate – and He is patient, loving and powerful.

When I was offered a job a month or so later writing for a newspaper, and so ended up writing four or five times a week, I knew it was no coincidence. God had seen the desire to move towards the good, and was giving me a very non-subtle leg up.

And so this Lent I’m thankful for the lessons learnt in that other Lent – that no matter how much I might be battling to live out what I’ve given up or taken up, God is patiently watching and wants to see this Lent bear fruit.

Naomi Leach is an artist and writer based in Sydney.