The season of Lent begins today (February 18th). Like Advent, Lent is a season in the historic church calendar designed to shape our hearts around the gospel of Jesus Christ.
But what exactly is Lent? And why should it matter for Christians today?
What Is Lent?
Lent is the forty-day season leading up to Easter. Historically, the church has set aside these weeks to focus on three primary realities: repentance, reflection, and renewal.
You might ask: Is Lent required? No. Scripture does not command Christians to observe Lent as a binding obligation. But throughout church history, believers have found spiritual benefit in marking time this way.
Lent offers:
- A structured season of self-examination and communal repentance
- A renewed focus on Christ’s atoning work
- A tangible way to grow our hunger for God
In a distracted age, Lent gives us a framework for slowing down, taking inventory of our souls, and reorienting our lives around the cross.
Repentance: Telling the Truth About Ourselves
One of the great gifts of Lent is its emphasis on repentance.
We live in a culture allergic to confession. We minimize sin, excuse it, rename it, or blame someone else for it. Lent invites us to do something radically freeing: tell the truth.
It calls us to examine our hearts, confess our sin, and rediscover the depth of our need for grace.
And here’s the beautiful irony: the more clearly we see our sin, the more brightly we see the love of Christ. When we honestly face our rebellion, pride, apathy, and misplaced loves, the cross becomes bigger — not smaller.
Repentance during Lent does not produce despair. It magnifies mercy.
Reflecting: Considering Jesus
The forty days of Lent echo the forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness, as recorded in Matthew 4 and Luke 4. In the wilderness, Jesus chose hunger over food, obedience over comfort, and the Father’s word over Satan’s lies.
Where we have failed, he stood firm.
Where we have given in, he resisted.
Where we have chosen self, he chose submission.
Lent also draws our attention to the final weeks of Jesus’ earthly life — what we often call Holy Week.
The events leading up to Good Friday changed everything. The Son of God was betrayed, mocked, beaten, and crucified. He entered into suffering voluntarily and obediently.
Lent helps us slow down long enough to see the magnitude of Jesus’s obedience, suffering, and sacrificial death in our place.
To help the people of Redeemer reflect well this Lent, we put together a Lent Devotional titled Return.
Renewal: Fasting as a Spiritual Discipline
Historically, Christians have practiced fasting during Lent. Fasting is not spiritual heroics — it is a spiritual discipline designed to grow our hunger for God.
So why fast?
1. Fasting Exposes Our Dependencies
Fasting reveals how often we run to created things for comfort, control, or escape. It might be food, social media, sports, entertainment, shopping, or even good things like books or hobbies.
When you remove something you habitually turn to, you begin to feel the pull of your flesh. That discomfort is revealing. It shows us how easily our appetites rule us.
Lent gives us space to ask:
What has too strong a grip on my heart?
2. Fasting Grows Our Appetite for God
Fasting is not just about what you put off—it’s about what you pick up.
You put away your phone so you can pick up the Scriptures.
You set aside a comfort food so you can turn to Christ for comfort.
You give up a convenience so you can lean more deeply into prayer.
Fasting reorders our loves. It trains our souls to say: “Man shall not live by bread alone.”
3. Fasting Cultivates Humility
Fasting is rarely neat and impressive. It often exposes weakness. It may even expose failure.
And that is a gift.
It reminds us that our standing before God is not built on our discipline but on the finished work of Christ. Lent should never produce pride. If it does, we’ve misunderstood it. Instead, it drives us into gratitude for grace.
Preparing for Easter
All of this — repentance, reflection, fasting — serves one great purpose: preparing our hearts for Easter.
We do not rush to resurrection without first walking through the shadow of the cross.
Lent heightens Easter joy. When we have spent weeks remembering our sin, the declaration “He is risen!” lands with greater force. When we have reflected deeply on Christ’s suffering, the empty tomb becomes even more glorious.
As Lent approaches, consider how you might engage this season intentionally.
- What needs to be confessed?
- What has captured too much of your affection?
- What might you set aside for forty days so that your dependence on God might grow?
The goal is not self-improvement.
The goal is deeper communion with Christ.
May this season grow in us an appetite for God above all else. And may the journey through repentance and reflection prepare us to celebrate Easter with fresh joy, deeper gratitude, and renewed love for the Savior who suffered and rose in our place.
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