Three Steps to A Great Lent

If the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed” – John 8:36.

About 27 years ago, I heard a priest give a life-changing homily about Lent. He told us to think of Lent as a time of spiritual renewal; a 40-day Spiritual Retreat that we get to experience with the entire Church; and because retreats are meant to be a special time of grace and intimacy with God, that is what we could hope to expect for our Lenten Journey as well. The only thing that is required is that we do “our part” in order to receive this blessing – we have to give him our five loaves and two fish.

What grace is God offering us during Lent?

This priest told us that one of the graces that God offers each one of us during Lent is the grace to grow in pure love by rooting out vice and growing in virtue. The means to this would be through a deeper intimacy with him. He suggested the following 3-Steps:

1st Step: Spend some time in prayer asking God what it is that he would like to eliminate from your life - something that stands in the way of loving him & others more selflessly.

2nd Step: Choose a virtue to work on that would help you in the battle against this vice or weakness

3rd Step: Choose one way to deepen your intimacy with God so that you could lean more on him for strength during this struggle.

Redemptive Suffering - Allowing God to use our discomfort to help other people

The priest also told us to “offer up” to God, as a prayer for others, the discomfort we experience as we struggle to eliminate this vice or weakness. This makes our struggle fruitful in two ways. First, when we “offer up” a difficulty to God - instead of succumbing to it - it is as if a wall has come down in our heart and we are giving him access to an area of our life that he was not able to come into before. Because he is present there now, we are not on our own and can draw from his strength and power to fight the difficulty. His strength begins exactly where our natural ability ends. Second, now that he is present, so is his self-sacrificing love, which we can tap into in order to offer up the difficulty as a prayer of intercession for others. In other words, He is present in our difficulty - we are now yoked with him - so that we can not only bear it patiently, but, we can go even further, and offer it up as an act of love for others.

After hearing this, I knew right away what God wanted me to do. I was a smoker at this time and I longed to be free of that addiction because it was definitely interfering in my role as a parent; but I also knew how difficult it was to quit. I had quit twice before only to start back up again.

As Lent was approaching, I begged the Lord to help me with this. I made the resolution to grow in the virtue of self-denial and to attend daily Mass as often as possible because I knew I would need to stay very close to God in order to kick this habit. As the priest suggested, I also made the resolution to “offer up” each craving as it came, for a specific person.

I will never forget what happened on Ash Wednesday. After I received Holy Communion, I had a thought enter my mind: “Your cravings will only last one minute.” I knew it was from God because up to that point I felt overwhelmed by the prospect of quitting because I thought that I would be craving cigarettes 24/7 for the rest of my life. The thought of each craving only lasting one minute gave me so much hope. As each craving came, I would watch the clock and, sure enough, each one was no more than 60 seconds; to top it off, the cravings came only about every 1.5-2 hours, which meant that in real time, I was craving a cigarette for a total of only 12-24 minutes each day instead of 24 hours continually.

I wrote my prayer intentions down in a notebook and as each craving came I would mark an X on the calendar and offer up that specific urge to smoke for a prayer intention on the list. It was hard at first, but by attending daily Mass, I was strengthened in my resolve to persevere. So many of my prayer requests were answered in obvious ways and I knew that God was using my “suffering” (my unsatisfied cravings) as intercession for others. It was a living sacrifice (Hebrews 12:1). This brought me so much joy.

Additionally, at the beginning of Lent, getting through each craving, one at a time, was all I could handle. I did not like the thought of never having another cigarette but by the end of Lent, I was thrilled by that prospect because God had even changed my desires. It has been 27 years and to this day, praise God, I have not had another cigarette. In John 8:36 he tells us that: “If the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”

I don’t know for sure, because I am not a scientist or a medical professional, but maybe other addictive cravings that we experience are short-lived as well. Wouldn't that make the prospect of breaking a bad habit or rooting out a sinful vice a little less intimidating?

In summary - My 3-Step Plan for Lent (in 1997):

1. Vice to root out: addiction to cigarettes (Fasting)
2. Virtues to grow in: self-denial; intercession for others (Prayer & Almsgiving)
3. Means: Union with Christ through frequent reception of Holy Communion; Redemptive Suffering (Prayer & Almsgiving)

The Lents that have been the most fruitful for me personally are when I follow a 3-step plan like this instead of just a 40-day fast from something I will enjoy again when Lent is over.

What is it that you long to be free from? What grace do you think our Lord is offering you this Lent? You are not alone! He will be with you every step of the way. He will help you to formulate a plan for Lent that is perfectly suited to your life.