Making Easter a More Vivid Experience: What I’m Learning from Lent

1. Giving up prepares me to receive.

The discipline of sacrifice, of forgoing a favorite past time or returning something I bought, or not eating what I want clarifies and strengthens. It clears away distraction. Focuses my attention on the road of Jesus’ sacrifice to the cross. I think of the self denial of Lent like the sherbet served in a fine restaurant before the next course. It cleanses the palate and prepares mind, heart and body to experience more keenly the journey ahead.

1. Giving up prepares me to receive.

The discipline of sacrifice, of forgoing a favorite past time or returning something I bought, or not eating what I want clarifies and strengthens. It clears away distraction. Focuses my attention on the road of Jesus’ sacrifice to the cross. I think of the self denial of Lent like the sherbet served in a fine restaurant before the next course. It cleanses the palate and prepares mind, heart and body to experience more keenly the journey ahead.

2. I’m entering into the Larger Story.

With the rise of Modernism and the Protestant Church, liturgy that felt meaningless was abandoned in many churches. Believers wanted to recover and focus on the teaching of God’s Word. Understanding. Clarity. Certainty. The way of entering into the Larger Story through the Church calendar was lost.

Except for abbreviated celebrations of Christmas and Easter, it was no longer the season of Advent or Lent. Growing up my church didn’t celebrate Palm Sunday. Or Good Friday. For many contemporary churches the spotlight is only on resurrection. Easter! Not suffering or crucifixition.

For the last seven or so years here’s how I’m recovering the Story: I prayerfully read the story in the gospels throughout Lent, especially during the final week of the Passion. Most years I’ve also read from a Lenten reader. I also open Immanuel, God with Us, Robert Doares magnificent drawings of the life of Christ, and set it on my sofa table, turning the pages each day.

Result: the drama of this Story has become much more meaningful. The conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders ratchets up. Jesus forces a showdown by driving his donkey straight into Jerusalem. Fulfilling prophecy. Accepting worship. Provoking the Sanhedrin to desperation. Our place! Our power! Our tradition!

They conspire to murder. Jesus wants out. Tonight Doares’ book is open to a picture of Jesus in Gethsemene, not kneeling with a halo, but prostrate in the dirt. Face to the side. Arms extended. Hands open. Pleading. I have never come close to praying like that over God’s will. For the love of the Father. For the love of outsiders. I think more deeply about Jesus’ love for us. We have no idea.

The conflict reaches a climax with the crucifixion. So the religious leaders think. The real climax of the story is the Resurrection two days later. What a terrific plot reversal and surprise ending of this act.

Entering into the story through Scripture, prayer and art makes it real. It reminds me that I am a character in this story and I have a strategic role to play downline.

3. I’m feeling more intensely the sorrow and joy of Easter.

As I read the story and study Doares’ powerful images I feel the growing tension. I mourn Jesus suffering. I rejoice in Jesus’ triumph over death. In fact, my joy on Easter Sunday is so much more vivid because I’ve deeply processed Jesus’ suffering and death.

Some make a case for not dwelling so much on Jesus suffering and death. After all, we live on this side of the resurrection. We should focus on and celebrate the victory.

But who goes to a movie or reads a novel and skips over the darkest hour before the dawn? If we skip over Han Solo frozen in ice or the Fellowship of the Ring breaking apart…if we just skip to the big Ewok party at the end or the crowning of the King then we have missed the real impact of the story. We’ve drasticly short changed our experience of the depth of the lows which make the heighth of the highs more joyful by contrast.

The apostle Paul earnestly desired, “that I may know him (Jesus) and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death…” Surely one way to share Christ’s sufferings is to deeply enter into the story of his suffering so that we might grasp a little more the depths of his sorrow and anguish and love for us. This then becomes a deeper source of strength and comfort as we enter our own trials and can trust that he understands. He empathizes. Are we betrayed and abandoned? So was he.

God has written the most wrenching, soaring drama conceivable. But we get so used to it. Throughout Lent the richness of “Jesus Saves” flows into my life. And again I am overwhelmed by the love of Christ. Thank you, Lord Jesus, my king and my God.

If you you have discovered some ways to make the experience of Easter more meaningful to you, what are they?