While it was still dark

Even now, we begin again

While it was still dark, we set out each morning, armed with hospital bags and the weight of fear, not knowing what the day would bring. Inside me squirmed two small, sick babies. One getting too much blood, one getting not enough. Everything was still dark inside. For them, for now.

While it was still dark, we drove every dawn to a different clinic, thanks to schedulers who worked the system, squeezing us in before opening hours. I’d heft my huge belly onto the examining table, tug up my maternity shirt, and turn my head to the ultrasound machine. While it was still dark, in the grainy snowstorm of the screen, there were my daughters: alive. For now. For another day.

While it was still dark.

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While it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been rolled away. She had set out alone, not knowing what she would find, only knowing that grief compelled. She was beckoned by rituals of anointing, and in different versions of the story, she walked with other women, talking in hushed voices on the darkened way, worrying how they would move the giant stone to do the holy work they had to do.

But what she found instead—while it was still dark, while she stayed at the tomb weeping—changed everything.

Sometimes when I stare down at the cold, stark stone above my daughters’ grave, I remember Mary. Brave enough to stay at the tomb, even when Peter and John raced away. Bold enough to confront a strange man and plead for the body of her friend. Humble enough to turn and turn again, hearing the sound of her own name, hearing the call we all long to hear. 

Every February when the days of grief return, I look at my own life. What has died. What has been buried. What has been resurrected.

While it is still dark.

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While it was still dark, Jesus got up and went out to a deserted place and prayed.

Wasn’t he Prayer itself? Wasn’t he God? Why would he need to pray?

Yet over and over he went out, seeking silence and solitude, seeking his Father, connecting with his Creator, driven by the Spirit. His work needed this regular rhythm of return, this grounding in prayer.

Lent reminds us that we need the same.

While it is still dark, we rise early and pour warm cups, steam rising like prayers. We wake children and make breakfast, trying to nourish ourselves and the ones around us. We drive to school and work and home, doing what needs to be done. We watch the news and shake our heads and close our eyes to pray. We call our leaders and walk the dog and talk with our neighbors. We work and rest and get up again. 

We keep going while the world quakes and crumbles.

While it is still dark.

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Even now, says the Lord.

Even now, we begin every Lent.

Even now, while it is still dark, we hear the same words we have heard every Ash Wednesday, taking up again the conversation we left behind last year, a long conversion toward our God.

Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart,
with fasting, and weeping, and mourning;
Rend your hearts, not your garments,
and return to the LORD, your God.

Lent begins while it is still dark. Always has, always will.

Right before Lent every year, I stand at the grave and mourn my daughters. I mourn a world that wounds all of us. But I stay there, listening. Waiting for the One who promised to return. In the silence and stillness he sought for prayer. In the hope of Easter joy that is still a long way off.

Even now, while it is still dark, we begin again.

Scripture to pray this Ash Wednesday:

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb…(John 20:1-18)

In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. (Mark 1:35)

The first reading from the Prophet Joel that begins every Lent: Even now, says the Lord… (Joel 2:12-18)

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Normally I send you links on Wednesdays. But today called for words. 

If you’d like to read more Lenten reflections, I’ll be sending out Scripture, essays, prayers, and practices each Saturday for paid subscribers: a new series called I AM: A Pilgrimage Through Lent that explores the 7 I AM statements Jesus made in the Gospel of John. All you need to do to receive them is become a paid subscriber, at any level.

p.s. My friend Erica Tighe Campbell at Be A Heart (featured this week in the NYT!) generously offered a free “Pilgrims of Hope” calendar for all participants in our Lenten pilgrimage. Simply use messygrace at checkout for your free calendar (minus shipping).