LENT

March 3rd, 2006. We are now into the 3rd day of lent. That means today is Friday. That means no meat. That means that my daughter is complaining because she can’t get through the day without eating meat. Of course if I told her she can have candy in its place, I’m sure she could sacrifice for today. But that would be too easy, wouldn’t it. And easy wouldn’t be lenten. 

I started with the date because to me it’s significant that it took until now for me to realize something that may not be significant to anybody else. And that is that the season that just began is called “LENT”. “You just realized that”, you may wonder. It wasn’t that it is called lent, but that it is called lent that struck me. HUH? 

Look, I was walking up to get my ashes on Wednesday when I stopped to listen to the ash imprinter guy who was saying, “from ashes you came, and to ashes you will return”. The first thing I thought was that I like it better when they say to repent and to hear the Good News. It just seems to have a more positive spin on things, you know? But then as I actually was getting my ashes it dawned on me. If I came from ashes and to ashes I’ll return, then what has been given me was for only a short time, and then it needs to be returned. Work with me here. In other words, I’m technically only borrowing it. Hold on, I’m getting there. 

(Cue the drumroll) So what I am saying is that all I have was LENT to me. By none other than God. Whoa! I’d never thought of it like that before. Things seemed to make a little more sense to me all of a sudden. Here we are remembering that what we have is not ours. We take 40 days to recall that our lives are on loan, and the truth is that when we borrow something, we should always return it in as good or in better conditions than before to show the person who gave us the loan that we appreciate the help and/or the opportunity they gave us. 

Well, isn’t that what we do in lent? We give something up or sacrifice something to help us “clean up” our acts for our Lord. We go out into the desert, figuratively, for 40 days, just as Jesus did 2000 years ago to prepare ourselves for whatever our Father has in store for us. And we try extra hard to curb the temptations that we normally give into to try to develop a greater inner discipline. This is all so that when it’s time for our personal models to be recalled, they will still be in good condition, hopefully in even better condition than when it was given to us. Hopefully at that point we will have earned a greater reward than the “loan”. It’s like a trial run. If we work well with was we borrowed then maybe we will get a better reward in the end. I guess it’s like a child that shows responsibility in chores and is rewarded with a pet because he/she has shown that they could handle the responsibility. Eternal life is our puppy that we are taking care of our loans for. Sorry for oversimplifying it, but sometimes things need to be put into simpler terms so that they could be understood or better even, made to look more attractive (not that eternal life with our Lord needs to be upplayed). 

Anyway, I now have a task at hand. Tidy up my loan. I could do that through the sacrament of reconciliation, going to mass an extra day of the week, or just adopting something new at home like a rosary night. I can also take better care of my body by doing some exercise and quitting some of the junk food. This is like detailing your car when you go get it washed. I can also read some to clean up my mind from all the stimuli that wear it down… let my imagination go to work, which leads me to this. I must continue to write (or ramble) so that I can emulate God by creating something. I can use the tools he gave me to create something great for others as he created a great world for me to live and love in. 

The good news is that I’m on the right track to doing these things, but if I don’t get on the ball, this loaner to get pretty darn dirty again. 

So, let’s make LENT special this year. Let’s show the Boss that we can take care of what he has left for us to take care of. Then as He tells us in the Gospels (and I’m paraphrasing here), if you show that you can handle small tasks here, you will be put in charge of greater tasks, and you will be rewarded proportionally to what you have done. 

Did I sound like a math teacher there? Well, I’m off. I have stuff to do before I bacome dust again. Little i can do while I’m just blowing the wind later.