A Lenten Reflection

We hit a deer while we were driving this week.  Having lived in the mountains for seven years now, friends here have told us it’s not so much a matter of if, it’s a matter of when.  Well, that when was Tuesday.  The four of us were okay, the car not so much, and we guess the deer, who bounded off the road, not at all.

All this in the season of Lent, the 40 days of the Church calendar when we remember Jesus’ sufferings on the Cross in light of our own sufferings in preparation for Good Friday.  As I think of the sufferings in my own life, even the shock of hitting a deer, making an insurance claim and being put out over this first world problem, these things are small compared to what is going on in our world.  Twenty-two wars going on right now globally. Economic teetering.  Instability of many kinds.  Still, these global sufferings along with my own are a sobering reminder that points to the strong need for redemption from our Lord Jesus.

These things bring a heaviness to my soul, and a bit of overwhelm, and nothing seems to sum it up better than King David’s cry to the Lord in Psalm 13:

How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I take counsel in my soul
and have sorrow in my heart all the day?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?
Consider and answer me, O Lord my God;
light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death,
lest my enemy say, “I have prevailed over him,”
lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.
But I have trusted in your steadfast love;
my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.
I will sing to the Lord,
because he has dealt bountifully with me.

How long, O Lord, indeed!

How long will the difficulties of this world seem to be exalted over me?

How long will people seemingly be able to do what they want and get away with it?

How long will injustice and greed rule our lands?

David’s words ring just as true today as they did for him some 3,000 years ago.  It could be easy to stop here, though, and call it good.  But, that would only lead to us living a life of despair.  Instead, we know that David, who knew God’s heart, brought things back to what really mattered.  In this Psalm, we see David crying out to God in the midst of his despair—“light up my eyes, so that I do not sleep the sleep of death.”  Provide us, Lord, with something greater than this, greater than ourselves.  Enlighten us in our
places of need.  Because of this, we do not need to be shaken by our enemies. Instead, David reminds us, we can trust in God’s steadfast love.  A love that is not shaken.  A love that remains.  And with this love, we can find joy in our salvation.

In closing, I wonder what it looks like in this time of Lent to consider how God has dealt bountifully with you.  In what places can we see God’s fingerprints, those places where God has given so many good things?  I understand that this won’t make the sufferings of our lives go away—from insurance claims to much larger problems—I wonder if it might make life more bearable, giving us the ability to persevere in God’s strength.  Ask of our Lord for the ability to see things from God’s perspective.  And may that changed perspective give newness of life, and the ability to persevere in God’s strength and not our own.

As we look to the cross and empty tomb, God’s peace to you and yours!