We hadn’t talked for awhile. We met for coffee. We placed our orders and went to the end of the counter to wait.

“Should I celebrate Lent?” he said.

“I don’t know,” I answered. “Are you satisfied with your relationship with God?”

He looked startled. I felt a little queasy.

“Who is? But what’s that got to do with Lent?”

We got our coffee and sat down. It gave me time to think. I usually am more diplomatic. I started writing about Lent for the people who kept Lent, to give them a different way to think. I never really thought about recommending the practice of Lent to others. And my friend was one of the others. He grew up in a non-Lent home. He’s not sure why I’m so interested.

We settled down at a table in the corner.

“Will celebrating Lent make God happy?” he asked.

“Nope”

“Will it make Him like me more?”

“Nope”

“Will it build up some kind of credit or a reservoir of good will? So that when I screw up the next time, I can say ‘But I was really good during Lent?”

He was mostly joking. But I saw a way to start talking.

“Does that work with your wife?” I asked. “Does that work with any other relationship that really matters to you? That you are nice so you can get away with stuff?”

He smiled. “Well, I try it with my boss. But when I try it with my friends, they know better. They can see right through me.”

“But you try it, right? You get real nice for a couple of days? You pick up the check for lunch?”

“Sometimes. But then they look at me. And we laugh. And then they ask me what I really need help with. And I quit trying to impress them. I turn off everything else and we talk.”

I sat quietly. 

“So Lent isn’t about impressing God, it’s about talking and listening?”

+++

Lent For Non-Lent People is training wheels for Lent
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And Lent starts with Ash Wednesday on March 5.