Not The Lent I Signed Up For

Sawdust carpet in Antigua Guatemala (photo by Annette Aguilar)

Lent. The season of slowing down and meditating on Christ's days leading to his death. Lent makes me homesick. There is nothing like lent in Guatemala. The city turns purple, and you will undoubtedly find processions throughout the season. The flower and sawdust carpets adorn streets.
The mayor's office publishes an official day-to-day calendar of all the city's activities. You can't escape it. And so this year, I started lent feeling meh. Feeling like it was not lent yet.

I gave some thought to the things I wanted to give up, and realize rather than giving up something, I much needed to take up an abandoned practice - getting up early. I really missed those early times of having an hour to myself. I envisioned great times of reading Scripture, digging deep, writing page after page in my journal, and why not, drinking that cup of coffee while still warm and in one sitting.

Alas, the one kid who wakes up every night with a different issue, the other kid who despite turning one still thinks I'm her personal 24-hour buffet, and my night-owl wayward ways, made me realized that I had not set myself up for success here. My friends and I read through Isaiah. The plan we were following was very heavy on the reading, and there were times I would read, and re-read, and still it would feel like nothing was entering my head.

So, I felt I was flunking lent. This whole season wasn't really going the way I had envisioned it. Then, one Friday afternoon, two weeks before Easter, one of the kids came down with a fever and started throwing up. That week, five of our little friends had been hospitalized with a stomach virus, and I just knew these were the same symptoms. A few hours later, I got a voice message from my brother Pablo, sharing some heavy health news. We spoke that night. Things were not looking great, but nothing could be known until he underwent surgery, perhaps in the next couple weeks.

That night, Roy and I took turns taking care of a sick little boy - my sick brother always in the back of my mind. As I watched Daniel sleep, I thought of how Jesus said we are to become like children. I had always thought if it as an invitation to the all-believing, joyful, laid back beings they often are. But here was a needy, weak and sick little boy. I thought of Jesus as a sick three year old boy.

Photo by Annette Aguilar

"Who has believed our message...?" Indeed. As I spent all my energy cloroxing every inch of my I could not risk contagion, it was really hard to believe this wild story of such dire suffering and salvation. It's still really hard for me to believe that a 29-year-old man whose diapers I changed as a baby, who I played hide-and-seek with, who I watched grow, is going through physical pain and anguish I cannot fathom.

"A man of sorrow... familiar with pain" And this cuts deep. Oh... pain and I are no strangers. But no matter how many times the pain has struck, I want to quickly turn my face away. I want to avoid more. I want to run away from it. And it is hard for me to see Christ in pain. I want to see him in glory. I want to see him in miracles. But I don't want to see him in pain.

I ended up driving past midnight to the ER with my boy. We were sent home about an hour later. Saturday afternoon, as I was still caring for the sick boy, still trying to clean up messes and keep the other two kids safe, we got another message. It was now the brother's turn to head to the ER, except his wouldn't be an hour-long visit. He would spend the next morning in surgery, where doctors were to find his cancer is back, rather aggressive. He spent the next three days in ICU. He then came home a week after that. Went back in this past Tuesday.

I spent hours the Monday after his surgery looking for flights. Nothing would work out. I've never experienced this before, but it really was impossible to fly during that week. And so, I stayed home... caring for the other two kids who had caught up with the virus. And as I sat there, a hundred questions racing through my mind, thinking 'when then, do I get to go?' the prophet I have been reading comes to mind:

"Who among you fears the Lord
    and obeys the word of his servant?
Let the one who walks in the dark,
    who has no light,
trust in the name of the Lord
    and rely on their God." (Isaiah 50:10)

No early morning, Scripture filled, coffee-flavored, long-handed journal entry Lent for me. But a messy, sickness-filled, uncertain, and scary Lent. And a Divine invitation to trust. I am reminded, once again, about Jesus farewell to his disciples, "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)