A man taking a walk in the countryside came across a shocking scene – a farm that had been razed to the ground by what seemed to be a recent fire.

In dazed horror, he wandered slowly through the smouldering wreckage. When he paused to try and visualise the chaotic scene that must have created this disaster, he looked down and noticed a charred mound with a few feathers protruding.

He poked it with his shoe and unintentionally flipped it over. He gasped when he saw what he had uncovered – a few live trembling chicks!

Immediately he imagined that, as the fire was falling all around the farm, the mother hen must have gathered her chicks under her body to shelter them, and had lost her life in the process of saving theirs.

This is the very picture our Lord Jesus Christ talked about in Matthew 23:37-39.

Like a mother hen 

In Matthew 23, we see two sides of Jesus.

In verses 1-36, we see his righteous anger as he rebuked the religious leaders and pronounced seven woes over them. He condemned them for their hypocrisy, for majoring on minors, and for their hostility towards anyone who did not conform to their traditions.

Yet here in verses 37-39, Jesus’ tone shifts to one of sorrow.

Like the wistful appeal of a lovesick father to his rebellious child, He sorrows over their hardened hearts and longs to be reconciled to them.

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings.”

Like the mother hen on the burnt farm, Jesus the Saviour comes, sheltering sinful people from the fire of God’s wrath and taking the fire upon Himself.

Time to look within

This anticipates the crucifixion and atoning death He would undergo.

But Jesus laments that they “were not willing” to take shelter under His wings. 

His protective love will never be forced upon the unreceptive. In His offer of salvation, Jesus comes as the meek Lamb of God.

But those with hardened hearts will mistake His gentleness for weakness and despise Him. And they will be allowed to make this choice. Sadly, He will have to say: “See, your house is left to you desolate.”

In this season, Lent plays an important role in the rhythms of the Church. Lent is the 40-day period from Ash Wednesday to Easter (not counting the six Sundays in between).

It is designed to be a time of heart examination, with an eye towards the death and resurrection of Jesus. It is a time of self-humbling through fasting and abstinence from creature comforts and dietary indulgences that dull our spiritual sensitivity and breed complacency and pride in us.

In short, Lent is a health screening period when Christians remind ourselves of our human tendency towards hardening of hearts towards the Lord.

Time to reset

In Lent, it is appropriate to slow down our pace of life because it is almost impossible to do deep reflection while hurtling around at top speed.

It is appropriate to tone down the celebrative aspects of our worship and give more emphasis to the meditative and introspective expressions. It is appropriate to spend less time speaking to God and more time listening to His voice, asking Him to reveal parts of ourselves hidden from our own eyes.

Like the Psalmist in Psalm 139:23-24, we can say: “Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!”

Once we have detected certain movements of the heart in the wrong direction, away from the Lord, we are to repent and return to Him wholeheartedly.

We are to once again run into His bosom and shelter under His wings. We are to redefine our identity by our relationship and intimate connection with Him, and not by our careers, possessions, family pedigree or whatever.

In short, we are to receive – by His grace – a health reset. And this takes time. Hence the 40 (+6) days.

This allows us to enter into the profound meaning and significance of Good Friday and Easter far more deeply than if we just went about life as per normal and then turned up at the Good Friday and Easter services spiritually unprepared.

So may the Lord help us have a blessed Lent, dear Brothers and Sisters!

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