Halfway to Home

“Halfway to home.” That was the first thought I ever associated with Columbia.

In college, I would make the 14-hour drive from Lexington, Virginia, to my hometown of Dunedin, Florida, in a single day. If I got on the road by 4:30 in the morning, I would be just south of Columbia between 10:00 and 11:00 a.m. Once I hit I-95, I knew I was halfway to home.

And halfway was always the hardest point of the drive. Dangerously caffeinated and abnormally alert because of my early start, the first few hours of driving in the dark flew by. As the sun rose around Charlotte I’d usually stop and get more coffee and find myself reinvigorated for the early miles driven in daylight. But by mid-morning, after six or seven total hours on the road, the knowledge that I was already halfway and yet only halfway would settle heavily upon me.

Halfway is the hardest point.

If that is true on a foolishly long drive undertaken by an invincible 20-year-old, it is true in Lent, too. Tomorrow is the 20th day of Lent. We are halfway through this season of fasting, self-examination, and self-denial. And halfway is the hardest point.

This is the hardest point if you are still maintaining your fast. By now, I expect you have a clear-eyed, unsentimental sense of the current state of your body and your soul. You know the place that the little indulgences you are temporarily foregoing ordinarily occupy in your mind and heart. You know how great a commitment the additional discipline you have undertaken really is. And you are only halfway to home.

This is also the hardest point if you have long since given up your fast. (If you are in this group, do not despair. Grace abounds. Always remember that we are saved by God and not by our pieties and spiritual practices!) By now, you can look back on the eagerness and enthusiasm with which Lent begins and recognize something of the frailty and fickleness and self-deception inherent in human nature. We leave undone the things we ought to have done, even the things we desire and intend to do. We do the things we do not wish to do. Twenty days is simultaneously a very short time and a very long time for creatures such as we are. Be gentle with yourself, and spend the remaining 20 days reflecting on the truth of our common humanity. You, too, are halfway home.

Halfway is the hardest point, whether journeying on a drive, or journeying through Lent, or indeed journeying through life. But let me offer a few tips I picked up when passing through Columbia some 20 years ago.

1. Call someone. One of the ways I'd make it through the hardest point of my long drive home was to call someone at the halfway mark. Often it was one of my grandmothers, even though the trip I was making would bring me right to them. Other times it was a friend I knew I wouldn't get to see when I was home. But making a connection and hearing the voice of someone we love and care about, and who cares about us, is critical on our journey in Lent and in life. Reach out. Call someone. Do not attempt this alone.
2. Take a break. I was really proud of my ability to make a day-long drive without stopping for anything but gas and a quick restroom break. Even in my early 20s, I sort of knew that that pride was foolish. At nearly 40, I know for certain that it is dangerous. As I have had occasion to write in a recent Dispatch, sabbath rest is not just essential for our spiritual and physical health, it is God's command. Take a break every now and again. The tradition of the Church honors our need for a break with the tradition of Lataere or Refreshment Sunday on the fourth Sunday in Lent. Traditionally, this was a day when the intense Lenten fast was relaxed ever so slightly, and folks could take a little break before plunging headlong into Passiontide, Holy Week, and Easter. Our souls and bodies need rest. Take a break.
3. Enjoy the drive. We humans have a tendency to instrumentalize many of our experiences. What I mean is that we can treat a long trip as just the necessary nuisance to be endured as we get ourselves from one actually-desired experience to the next. As a result of this tendency we can forget that the drive itself–each passing mile marker, left-lane-hogging semi, shabby fast food restaurant, and, yes, each traffic jam–is part of a precious present reality. It may be different from or even opposed to the reality we desire. But it is here, it is real, it is true. Enjoy the drive. Be in the present. For in the present dwells the One whose unfailing presence is the end of all our journeying; the One who is with us both when the road clears before us, and when the tiresome traffic snarls us–and through all out wrong turns and fender benders, too. Be present, even in the awful stuff. For God in Christ is ever present, in the awful stuff.

We are halfway to home, beloved. There is a lot of Lent behind us, and a lot of Lent yet before us. May we reach out to and support one another along the way. May we remember to rest, that we might ultimately have strength to finish our course. And may we find ways to enjoy–and even to rejoice in–each step of this journey of fasting and penance that brings us to the Day of Resurrection, and a joy which hath no end.