"The woods are lovely, dark, and deep"

The following are excerpts from Jesus Calling by Sarah Young:

"Waves of adversity are washing over you, and you feel tempted to give up. As your circumstances consume more and more of your attention, you are losing sight of me. " February 27


"Don't look for affirmation in the wrong places: your own evaluations, or those of other people. The only source of real affirmation is My unconditional Love." February 28


"You are on the right path. Listen more to Me, and less to your doubts. I am leading you along the way I designed just for you. Therefore, it is a lonely way, humanly speaking." February 29


I am realizing more and more that I have a need for a daily devotional not just as a catalyst to dig into the Word, but also as a catalyst to look inward. I need to see the things within myself that I don't want to see so I can deal with the things that need to be dealt with. The last three days of my devotional have done just that. They have spoken to my desire to just give up (not even knowing what that looks like), feelings of inadequacy, and a loneliness that is just as palpable in a room full of people as it is when I lie awake in the middle of the night.

I'm guessing this is what one gets when they offer up their own ease and comfort for forty days. Why would we expect any less when we willingly walk into the wilderness? And I guess there is no other way to comprehend God's longing for our hearts to be only His, than to have all we want stripped away--even for a short time. I know God doesn't want me to be afraid, lonely, unseen, or inadequate. But maybe I need to feel those feelings when I look to humans or circumstances to fill a need they can't possibly fill. And maybe that is the wilderness journey I have to offer these next few weeks: the willingness to walk down a dark path, alone in order to know without a doubt that Someone goes before me to make the way.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep. --Robert Frost

Easy doesn't do it any more

I have had a lot of conversations about Lent the last few days.  When I left the Catholic Church, the rebellious child in me rejoiced in not feeling obligated to observe Lent. I rejoiced in knowing that my salvation was secure and there was nothing I had to do to keep it that way. There were no longer any religious hoops for me to jump through. And I liked it that way. Then I grew up.

Suddenly my understanding of what it means to be a Christian--to seek to be Christ-like--changed dramatically.  I realized that if I internalized the Gospel so that my everyday life could begin to look like Christ, then I had some eternal obligations that were much greater than those any man or religious institution could impose upon me. The nonconformist in me doesn't have to conform. She has to be transformed. That is so much harder.

Maybe this is why, as an adult, Lent speaks to my heart. The intentionality of sacrifice. A set time in which the giving up aligns with the giving in. A time in which we can work out for ourselves in tangible ways the concept of sacrifice. A concept that goes against my human nature. My humanity seeks the easy. So this year, that is my focus for Lent. I will forsake the easy in my walking around life. I will stop defaulting to the easy outs in my life--foods, conversations, excuses. I will stop looking for corners to cut. In these forty days, I will seek to tear down my little altars to little gods I often unknowingly constructed, so that my life itself becomes a living altar to a Christ who stepped down off the cross to live in me.

This year, I sacrifice the easy.