Contemplation is increasingly rare, it seems, especially in a time when nearly everything is measured in moments rather than hours, days, weeks, and years. We are simply too busy or too distracted by other concerns to pause and observe the physical world around us and the spiritual world within us. 

For Catholics and Protestants, Ash Wednesday (February 17^th this year) is the inauguration of Lent, a forty-day period of spiritual meditation which culminates just before Easter. It implores the faithful to prayer, fasting, penance, self-denial, repentance, and charity. Just as the Thanksgiving season is intended to encourage a grateful heart, Lent challenges the follower to reflect upon Christ’s forty-day temptation in the wilderness and one’s own personal struggle with enticement to sin. The classic Greek dictum, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” is perhaps a general summary of the necessity for Lenten seasons.

Lent is a call to self-examination. To be sure, just looking in the morning mirror is overwhelming at times. How much more revealing are the shortcomings of the soul when seen through a spiritual prism? Reflection can cause us to experience remorse, regret, and sorrow, time and again, if we cannot purge the soul in the manner of confession and repentance. Although I am not Buddhist, there is a saying that I believe rings true, “Just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.”

Unfortunately, we live in a time where past mistakes are no longer chalked-up to adolescent immaturity or wrong-headed thinking. The rule of the day is more akin to adherence to an impossible set of moral standards imposed by those who cannot measure up themselves. These failings last in posterity through technological cataloging such as social media. Every utterance, every picture, every group that one has ever been a part, defines us in gross and lasting stereotypes.

Sadly, few celebrate the repentant soul that overcomes the pitfalls encountered in any life. What is remembered is a person’s fall from grace rather than rising from the ashes. The greatest biblical sinners are often chosen by God to demonstrate mercy and grace and remind us that each has need for forgiveness, too. News flash, “Our heroes were not always heroic.”

What can we say then of Lent? Perhaps, it is time to consider our nature and the nature of the world a little more closely. Rather than condemn any or every action by those who have stumbled, maybe it is our turn to recognize our shortcomings first. Just as we hope for grace from others, we, too, should be a force for grace. Anyone willing to honestly contemplate their position before God and has a desire to be wiser in action and deed has my vote. If the process of prayer, fasting, penance, and so forth, produces an examined and changed life, it is worth it.

Kent Simmons is the pastor of Canyon Community Church in Kingman, AZ. He can be reached at kent@canyon-church.com.