Lent, Lament and Lockdown
Lent is a time of self denial and of giving things up, and also a period of lament in the lead up to Easter where we remember the Passion and death of Christ before we celebrated the glorious resurrection.
Often this is a personal affair on the discipline side of things, even if it’s a practice shared within your church community, but this year has been so very different. With the outbreak of the coronavirus, or COVID-19, the whole world has slowly gone into lockdown country by country, creating a strange sort of global “Lent” where everyone is having to practice self control and self denial. This has been underpinned with a sense of lament at the way things were, the way things should be, and all of the things — and people — we’ve lost.
I don’t think it’s coincidental that the most isolating part of this pandemic happened during the Lenten season, causing us all, Christian or otherwise, to stop, step back and reflect on life.
While it can feel a little gloomy of late with all the isolation and lack of social and religious meetings, we mustn’t think that God has abandoned us — likewise we also shouldn’t lose faith.
The Bible isn’t a stranger to times of lament and distress, and we see it often in the Psalms. At times like this of limited food and resources and job loss, we can probably relate to David when he wrote things like this:
Psalms 86:1
Incline your ear, O LORD, and answer me, for I am poor and needy.
Psalms 102:1–2
Hear my prayer, O LORD;
let my cry come to you.
Do not hide your face from me
in the day of my distress.
Incline your ear to me;
answer me speedily in the day when I call.
And such poetic sadness from the book dedicated to lament;
Lamentations 3:16–18
He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
and made me cower in ashes;
my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness is;
so I say, “Gone is my glory,
and all that I had hoped for from the LORD.”
Hope in the face of darkness
As we look forward to the end of this pandemic with hope like a light at the end of a tunnel, in the meantime we just learn to live in the darkness as the Apostles did on those gloomy days between the crucifixion and the resurrection; when their world ended but was then reborn better than ever expected!
They only had to wait a couple of days to see their hope realised, whereas we have no idea how long this will last. How long will we go without seeing friends and family, meeting up at restaurants or going to church again? Only time will tell, but in the midst of this, we shouldn’t worry but rather cling onto the hope of God as the Psalmist did, as the Apostles did and so many others before us.
And in the words of the author of Lamentations: “…the Lord will not reject forever … for he does not willingly afflict or grieve anyone.” (Lamentations 3:31,33).
There is always light at the end of darkness if we put our hope in Christ.
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)
