The Slow Way: Lent, Repentance, and “Practices for an Evolving Faith”
Sarah Bessey writes: “Repentance is actually a beautiful life-giving reorientation toward God's good path of flourishing with ourselves, our neighbors, and our world.”
In her new book Field Notes for the Wilderness: Practices for an Evolving Faith, Sarah Bessey writes to an audience in various stages of faith deconstruction. This book is a kind of compass toward reconstruction, though she doesn’t use that word. Her book is a guide for those who have found themselves in the wilderness and aren’t sure how to move through the pain and loneliness of losing certainty, community, or the comfort of what their faith used to look like. She quotes her friend and collaborator, the late Rachel Held Evans who explained it this way: “An evolving faith is simply faith that has adapted in order to survive.” This is the the kind of adaptation that, according to Sarah, “has proven to be about the questions, the curiosity, and the ongoing reckoning of a robust, honest faith. An evolving faith brings the new ideas and ancient paths together.”
This book is a collection of Sarah’s own notes toward that process. She has a gentle way about her, a wise-woman, pastoral feel as she invites her readers to consider how those new ideas and ancient paths might be in conversation with one another.
I’ve long admired Sarah Bessey since our shared early days of blogging, circa 2010. What I loved about her work then is still the sparkle that brings me back to her writing now: Through each transition of her faith, she has held tight to relentless hope. It has seemed to buoy her and her work. What I’m trying to say is this: Sarah is earnest in her love for Jesus, and she has never once apologized for that ardor.
We’re one official week into the season of Lent, and I’ve been thinking about the practices Sarah is inviting us to, especially the ancient teachings that many who have left evangelicalism (deconstructed, evolved) may have felt the need to leave behind. Sarah is asking us to consider picking some of them back up, reclaiming them as an act of hope.
One of those practices that has been problematic for many of us who grew up in the Church is the idea of repentance, a practice that has often been used in Christians spaces to shame, coerce, and instill fear. She begins with inviting us to that old, problematic word, sin. Even as it’s been weaponized through “manipulation and guilt, gaslighting and shame,” Sarah insists that “I find I still need it. I need the weight and the gravity of the word, the seriousness.”
I love this argument. Last week I wrote about how the season of Lent is powerful precisely because of its insistence on restraint. I think our culture needs a little seriousness, even those of us who experienced harm in the way the notion of sin was weaponized against us. (I’m thinking especially how this has harmed my Christian siblings who identify as LGBTQ+.) Becoming serious about repentance is not the same as embracing shame. Shame leads to relational rupture; serious contemplation leads to transformation.
I think that’s what Sarah’s saying here: “Repentance is actually a beautiful life-giving reorientation toward God's good path of flourishing with ourselves, our neighbors, and our world.” It’s “the changing of a mind that leads to the changing of a life.”
Lent is a 40 day opportunity to lean into that kind of reorientation. I’ve written here many times about how helpful I’ve found my pastor Michael Rudzena’s definition of sin as “anything that cuts against the grain of love.” If that’s what we mean by sin, then repentance is an invitation to righten ourselves, to adjust so we once again cut along with the grain. Another way of saying this would be that repentance allows us to reposition ourselves in the path of God’s goodness in the world, or “[turn] back toward that path of Love.”
The way I’ve always heard repentance described in a lifetime of church-going has been “turning around.” You’re walking one direction and then you pivot, face the other way. But sometimes reorienting to the direction of Love is simply making some small adjustments. Paying attention to our relationships, our choices, even our alignment with power, money, and systems that oppress.
“Repentance,” Sarah writes, “isn’t just cerebral or emotional, it’s also embodied.” The gift of Lent is that during this season, especially as we practice whatever we’ve added or subtracted from our ordinary lives, we can be reminded multiple times a day to make those adjustments in our thinking minds, our imaginations, and our bodies.
Repentance is the acknowledgment of our missteps, and the adjustment of our stance so we are in line with Divine Love. And this, according to Sarah, requires vulnerability and grief.
Can we get serious this week? Serious enough to acknowledge to ourselves, to God, and to one another how we have missed the path of Love? May we carry the weight of God’s transformative kindness, believing Sarah’s words: “There is no place you can go where you will outrun God’s love and longing for your wholeness.”
A Slow Practice
One way to practice repentance is to take a kind of spiritual inventory. I like this word “inventory” because it feels nonjudgmental and practical. We’re just checking things out, looking honestly at ourselves and how we are living in the world.
Today I want you to take some time to consider several questions, which I hope will guide you into some bigger questions about your life. This practice will probably take a bit longer than my usual offerings around here. But it’s Lent! This is a meaningful time of the year to give yourself a little extra time to work through how you’re living.
I’ve divided these questions into categories. Maybe you’ll want to consider one category a day for a few days if you don’t have enough time to get through all of it at once. Some of these questions may be helpful and some may not. Skip what doesn’t work for you. Go deeper into questions that do.
As you consider, think about Sarah’s notion that repentance isn’t just about the thinking mind or the emotions, but is embodied in our lives. We live that repentance out in our actions and relationships. Whatever comes up for you, I hope we’ll all consider how we might respond to with vulnerability and embodied transformation.
Relational Love:
How do I handle conflicts or disagreements in my relationships? Do I avoid them, charge into them, or approach them with genuine curiosity and understanding? Am I actively pursuing peace with the people I love?
Are there people in my life who are longing for my attention? How might I move toward them with thoughtful generosity?
Are the any people I avoid because of my own failures, hurt, or unwillingness to forgive? What would Love have me do about these relationships?
Love of Myself:
Do I treat myself with the same curiosity and generosity that I extend to others?
Am I setting healthy boundaries in my relationships? Do these boundaries come from a place of mercy?
Do I practice self-reflection and forgiveness, recognizing that I am worthy of grace?
Love of my Neighbors and the World:
How do my daily actions and lifestyle choices impact the natural world? When am I choosing my own comfort or ease of life over care of God’s creation?
How do my daily actions and lifestyle choices impact those who live in poverty, both in my community and in the broader world?
How often am I aware of race in my daily life? For those of us who are white: Do I recognize the moments where I am aligned with power that dehumanizes some and prioritizes others based on race?
Do I actively challenge discrimination and promote inclusivity in all spaces when it comes to race, sexual orientation or gender, and disability? What is one next step I can take toward the practice of inclusion?
How do I shop? Am I aware of who makes my clothes or who grows my food? Have I taken the time to learn where my things are made and how? Have I practiced gratitude to the hands that create the things I own, or grow the food I eat?
Integration and Action:
Am I open to listening to the nudges of Love in my day? Think through the last twenty-four hours and consider where I noticed opportunities to care for myself, others, or the greater world. Did I take them? Did I move past them? Why or why not?
What helps me pay attention to those Divine nudges in my life?
When you are ready, ask yourself is there is a commitment you need to make: to work toward peace in a friendship, to work toward inclusion or actively challenge discrimination in your community, to change how you’re living in order to more fully care for the world. Commit yourself to notice, practice vulnerability, and move toward an embodied response in your ordinary life.
End with this prayer: You, God, are the path of goodness, peace, and self-giving Love. Teach me to walk in your path, and return to your path when I’ve traveled off-course, knowing that your mercy is new every morning. Teach me to trust in your love and longing for my wholeness.*
*these words in italics belong to Sarah Bessey
A Note:
Tomorrow is my “Embracing Our Limits, Discovering Our Wholeness” workshop! If you are a paid subscriber who signed up but you haven’t gotten an email with information about the workshop from me, drop me a note in the comments or send me an email at michaboyett@gmail.com. Can’t wait!
This is so beautiful and thoughtful, Micha! I'm overwhelmed, truly. Thank you! xo
It is also a great gift which we are grateful for