Forty days. Moses went up on the mountain for forty days, Elijah was in the desert for forty days, and Jesus spent forty arduous days in the wilderness fasting and being tested. I’m no Moses or Elijah…and I’m definitely not Jesus but this year as the period of 40 days that lead up to Easter approached, I felt convicted about renouncing something for Lent. I grew up attending Catholic Church so I’m a veteran Lenter. When I was 9 I gave up riding my bike…I’ve given up chocolate, ice cream, every non-water beverage. I tried coffee once and failed. Actually, the vice I surrendered this year is one I attempted to relinquish a few years ago and I’m ashamed to say Lent only lasted two days.
This year, though, God has blessed me with my most meaningful 40 day stint. Here are the terms and conditions: I’ve given up radio/Ipod /cd’s -- any music in the car for the duration of Lent. The only solace in the whole effort is my self-given permission to listen to music when I have passengers -- of course only for the benefit of my company. The first days were detox. I would get in the car and inadvertently begin rotating the volume knob clockwise, only noticing what I was doing after prolonged silence and a realization that no sound was coming out. Sometimes I would turn the key in the ignition, put the car in drive, and then go for the power button on the radio. I’d start singing with Billy Joel and then throw my hand over my mouth like an eight year old who accidentally just said a swear and then I’d immediately press the button again…but this time shamefully.
I knew the Spirit had laid it on my heart to give up a little noise in my life. Quickly, I began to comprehend that my brief abandonment of consumerism was giving birth to a deeper hunger for the Lord. In the silence I discovered a desire to confess…I can’t imagine that any human desires this without prompting from the Spirit. Every morning on the way to work I would confess my inequities. Sins would pour from my heart and into God’s able hands. There is an intimacy that exists between creator and created when personal piety is relinquished.
In the name of my new found appreciation for confession…let me acknowledge that I half-expected to run out of sin to bring to God [which I think might be sinful]…but it was this sanctimonious idea combined with a substantial amount of solitude that became the perfect recipe for discovery.
This is what I learned about SIN. Sin is not just an individual act of disobedience and when we view it that way we feed this illusion that we can just avoid sin and be “good people.” We have so many preconceived notions about sin. When we hear the word we think of particular things that “bad people” do. Sin has been manipulated and used against us by believers and non-believers.
Sin is none of those things. Sin is the state we are in. It is human nature. It is our desire to rebel – or to just do it ourselves. It is the pursuit of self and our cheap, unfulfilling culture. It is living out of rhythm with our maker.
Romans 8 says it more powerfully than I ever could. I wanted to copy and paste the whole chapter from The Message but I refrained…here is the meat:
“In his Son, Jesus, God personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.
The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn't deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.”
These days I don’t even think about music when I’m driving. I just think. I pray. I confess. I’m healed. I’m thankful. I rediscovered God’s mercy and my desperate need for it. I’m happy.
Jenna Trapasso
April 18
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