Lent n' Wills

For many of us of the Christian tradition, this week marked the beginning Lent. Perhaps you joined an Ash Wednesday service and heard the words “to dust you shall return.” You might have noticed some of your friends with ash on their forehead. 

My introduction to Ash Wednesday happened, when as a young adult Protestant, who knew nothing about Catholicism, I told a friend she had dirt on her forehead! And I was trying to be helpful! 

Wednesday David and I literally embraced the reality that ‘to dust we shall return’ as we met with our lawyer to update our wills. 

This has been something we have talked about for months. If you had asked me if I had an up to date will, that is reviewed every five years, I would have answered, ‘Yes.’ In reality it has been seven years! How easily time slips by. 

Updating my will causes me to face my mortality - something I have embraced intellectually, yet to be honest, not so much in my heart. Still the death of three close friends in the past seven months brings the face of my mortality home in a new way.

In updating my will I am preparing for death. I am taking care of business for my descendants.

I find it interesting that this ‘will’ conversation happened on Ash Wednesday. I thought about that. I’ve come a long way from that awkward reference to ‘dirt’ on a friend’s forehead to embracing the mystery of rituals. 

While wills are one important piece of preparation for death, I believe Lent prepares me for living now. 

Lent provides a forty day framework to be intentional about taking care of the business of the heart. Somewhat like a 12-step program, Lent invites us “to do a fearless and moral inventory.” “To declutter my heart” as Joyce Rupp writes. To take a look in the mirror of my heart and see what might stop me from living an abundant life. 

For me Lent is less about giving up something - unless that something hinders my ability to wonder and to dream. For me, Lent is also not about guilt, no matter what you were taught as a child.

I need the framework of Lent. I need the intentional time set aside to ask intentional questions. For just like thinking my will was up to date, and talking and talking about ‘getting to it,’ the weeks and months can slip by without pausing to notice. Just like intentionally naming in a will what material goods I hope to leave to my descendants, Lent invites me to be intentional in taking the time to reflect on what might hinder my ability to experience the Divine Spirit within and beyond.

So in whatever way speaks to you, whether it be through quiet mediation or joy-filled song, whether it be through a quiet walk, an ambitious swim or working out in the gym, whether it be through quilting, zumba or yoga, these forty days of Lent may be a good time to be intentional about checking in with your heart. 

What do you think?