In the bapti-costal church of my youth, we didn’t observe Lent. Our only preparation for Resurrection Sunday was dying Easter eggs and “laying out” our clothes for the five o’clock Sunrise service on Easter Sunday morning.

A few years later as a young pastor, through my affiliation with an ecumenical fellowship of ministers I grew to appreciate the season of Lent and the various services of Holy Week.

Across the years, I have come to value Lent as a season of preparation and consecration, and I look forward to Holy Week as a time to re-trace the steps of Jesus from Palm Sunday to Easter.

Early on I understood Lent to be a time to “give up” something significant to me, something like sweets, chocolates, or other cherished foods. While the temporary avoidance of specific items may be associated with this season, I now approach Lent more as a time of focus than of fasting.

Acclaimed theologian, N.T. Wright, proposes that “Lent is a time for discipline, for confession, for honesty, not because God is mean or fault- finding or finger-pointing but because he wants us to know the joy of being cleaned out, ready for all the good things he now has in store.”

This week we will begin our Lenten journey with the observance of Ash Wednesday. At my church we will sing and pray as we focus on Psalm 51 and I John 1:9-10. Then we receive the disposition of ashes as we depart. And our Lenten journey will begin.

Lent as a season for reflection. It is a time to focus on God’s purpose for our lives, which is the key to understanding our purpose on this planet. And many aspects about God’s will for our lives can be brought into clearer perspective as we contemplate the teachings of Jesus, including his sermons, his suffering, and his resurrection.

Lent is a season for repentance. When we repent, we confess our sins and forsake our sins. The Bible makes two things extremely clear: 1. We have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:10 NIV); 2. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (I John 1:9 NIV)

Lent is season for realignment. Lent is a time to refocus on what it means to be a follower of Jesus and to realign with God’s mission in the world today. In the course of daily living, our lives easily get out of tune. Lent is a time to tune the piano of our lives to correspond to the middle C of God’s initiatives. Or, it’s like realigning the tires on our car so that they are going precisely the same direction. Lent summons us to submit the divergent components within our self to the tailwinds of the Spirit.

By embarking on a slow and reflective Lenten journey, we are better prepared for a meaningful celebration of the resurrection on Easter Sunday morning.

(Barry Howard serves as the pastor of the Wieuca Road Baptist Church in Atlanta. You can follow his blog at http://www.barrysnotes.wordpress.com or on Twitter @barrysnotes.)