Easter Egg Lent

Maundy Thursday was not observed at Clyattville Baptist Church. We went straight from Christmas to Easter without Lent getting in the way. Why not go from one glorious celebration to another? We sang songs about Lent and the Crucifixion year round... I Come to the Garden Alone, At the Cross, The Old Rugged Cross, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, Alas, and Did My Savior Bleed... but we never set the time before Easter apart as special, deserving of attention and time. Now it is the most holy time of the religious year for me.
It is not a happy time, a time full of all the peacelovejoyhope at Advent or the Heisnothereheisrisen exclamation of Easter. It is a time of remembrance and a time for self examination. These can be painful, tender, and illuminating exercises for the soul but they are not for the casual participant or observer. Precisely demanding one’s full attention, Lent requires you to listen more closely, see more clearly, feel the pain and suffering.
As I stood peeling my boiled eggs this morning for breakfast, it occurred to me that Lent as a season is very much like an egg. In order to get to the heart of the egg, you have to peel away the outer shell, pierce the protective layers that serve as protection and fortress. Like the egg, I can live very comfortably encased in all my layers of perception without ever venturing into the dark center of my soul. If I choose to not make the inward journey, my loss, God’s loss, is the perpetuation of an unexamined life.
I read a Chinese proverb this morning in a Lenten meditation written by an Episcopal priest, a woman who has lived and ministered in China for nineteen years. " People comb their hair every morning. Why not their heart?" Fear of what I might find or what might be required of me, fear of there being no forgiveness for the sins I have committed, fear of never being able to find the light again, fear of judgement and harsh retribution, fear... There is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out fear... We love because he first loved us. 1 John 4:18-19
Maundy Thursday... The Latin word "mandatum", the root for Maundy, reminds us of the ultimate commandment Jesus offered. We are to love as we have been loved. We are to love ourselves, others and our God. There is nothing to fear in Lent. There is a way through the darkness. Rituals and patterns can help us move closer to God and become more nearly who we were created to be. So as I wash someone’s feet on Holy Thursday remembering the disciples feet being washed by Jesus, participate in communion and remember the last meal Jesus shared with his friends, remember to whom I belong and the price Jesus paid for being the Son of God, I will be asking for light to come to my darkness. I will be searching my heart for fear and anger. I will be praying for Perfect Love to come and live within and without so that I might be transformed, redeemed, resurrected to new life, born again one more time to love as Jesus loved. May it be so, please?