Lessons From a "Lent-Free" Heritage

I don't remember hearing anything about Lent in my church when I was growing up. Now it's very possible that I simply wasn't paying attention - I've been known to do that - but honestly, I think Lent was something that was just not a part of our language or tradition. It was one of those practices we tended to identify with those "other" churches, the ones we viewed as being caught up in ritual and formality. As evangelicals in the holiness tradition, it wasn't our thing. So, most of the people I looked to in my formative years either didn't think about Lent at all or dismissed it as irrelevant. I now believe that I missed out on something all those years.

I have come to embrace the observance of the Lenten season as something beneficial and spiritually renewing. To set aside a period of time for fasting and spiritual reflection sharpens my focus and attention on the things of God's Kingdom, it brings a new awareness and sensitivity to the voice of the Spirit. As I move toward the celebration of Christ's resurrection, listening with deliberate intention, I am changed, seeing and understanding more of what it means to truly pick up the cross and be a follower of Jesus. Lenten practices have, for me, proven to be more than rituals or irrelevant traditions; they have become instruments of God's transforming grace.

I am not the only one in my tradition to have made this discovery. Many of our churches have found an appreciation for the Lenten season and have embraced it as a part of their worship and spiritual practice. Back when I was young (which is getting further away all the time), I had never heard of a Nazarene church holding an Ash Wednesday service. Now, I can name several that do so. Personally, I'm glad to see it.

My reflection on this has made it apparent to me once again that, sometimes, we end up cutting ourselves off from good and beneficial expressions of the faith simply because we think they belong to that "other" group. Churches naturally tend to emphasize their particular distinctive, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. There are theological and doctrinal differences that exist, and those should not be diminished or ignored. However, we can become so concerned about avoiding or countering the distinctive understandings of other traditions that we end up diminishing or neglecting significant aspects of Christian faith and practice.

While points of disagreement certainly do exist among the various traditions of the Church, our reaction to those disagreements has too often pushed us to reject too much. We have neglected various styles of worship, ignored certain spiritual disciplines, and even, at times, diminished the sacraments because we associate them with another tradition that has points of disagreement with our own. Yes, the points of disagreement matter, but so do the points of agreement. Certainly we can acknowledge both and learn from one another. For those in my church who start to get a little nervous with this kind of talk, let me remind you that the historical statement in the Manual of the Church of the Nazarene begins this way: The Church of the Nazarene, from its beginnings, has confessed itself to be a branch of the "one, holy, universal, and apostolic" church and has sought to be faithful to it. . . As its own people, it embraces the people of God through the ages, those redeemed through Jesus Christ in whatever expression of the one church they may be found.

May that be more than just words for us; may it be a truth revealed in our spirit and practice. Some things are not confined to the categories of Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox, Nazarene, Baptist, Pentecostal, Lutheran, mainline, evangelical, traditional, contemporary, and so on. Some things are just Christian, an expression of the "one, holy, universal, and apostolic" church. To lose them is to lose part of who we are, and we do so to our own detriment.