FIRST SUNDAY OF LENT
‘The Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness’
The word Lent means springtime. It is the season of lengthening days, new life, new hope, new beginnings. The Latin root of the word is ‘lente’, which suggests the call to slow down, proceed slowly, gently, carefully. In the first three centuries of the Christian era, the followers of Christ prepared for Easter by praying and fasting for three days. In some places, this was extended to the entire week before Easter. By the fourth century Lent had developed to its’ current length of forty days to replicate the time Jesus spent in the wilderness in preparation for His public ministry. The Wilderness is a barren strip, thirty-five miles by fifteen between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea. In that bleak place, He couldn’t have been more alone. He is confronted by Satan, but emerges victorious from the struggle. Nobody witnessed the dramatic event, so He must have reported it often to His friends. The episode raises the curtain on the Lenten drama and invites us once more to enter the quiet place where deepening and re-evaluation take place.
‘Solitude is the audience chamber of God’.