In 2012, by the Saturday following Ash Wednesday I regretted my Lenten sacrifice with my whole heart. I lay on the couch in the living room of our apartment with my two small boys, ages five and two, watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, moaning through my caffeine withdrawal headache, and counting the minutes till naptime.

Yes, friends, I gave up coffee for Lent. I gave up coffee for Lent while parenting two small children. I gave up coffee for Lent the same month that Chris transitioned out of the military and started his first job in the civilian workforce. I gave up coffee for Lent the same month we moved into a rented apartment with rented furniture and kitchen basics in the largest city I’d ever lived in where I knew not a single person.

In my defense, I was still learning about Lent. I think 2012 was my fifth full year as a Catholic. I didn’t have the cultural knowledge my children have grown up with about appropriate sacrifices and penances. Someone had said that the hardest thing they’d ever given up for Lent was coffee and, in my ignorant and Icarus-like heart, I decided I could easily do that. None of that stuff going on in my life factored into my decision.

Physically and mentally, I shouldn’t have chosen such a hard sacrifice during that challenging year. Spiritually, though, it was inappropriate. Not only could I not give up coffee easily, I didn’t attempt it for the right reasons. I chose coffee as my sacrifice to prove that I was strong.

With imprudence and pride guiding my heart and Chris out of town for the day, suddenly that Saturday became the desert.

My oldest son got out markers, and, finding no paper, proceeded to draw on his arms. But with my head buried under a pillow, I didn’t notice until he started in on his little brother’s arms. As I scrubbed both boys clean, how I wished for a cup of coffee.

Later, my younger son decided to give his favorite stuffed animal a bath in the toilet. I heard that up-to-no-good toddler giggle from the couch, but it didn’t fully register due to my brain fog. It was only later, when I finally stood up to clean the kitchen and stepped on a soggy carpet that I understood something was wrong. Not only had he given the stuffie a bath, but he’d then taken the “clean” friend all over the apartment. As I scrubbed the carpet, rung out the stuffed animal, and put both boys into a bath, all I could think about was going into the kitchen and starting the coffeemaker.

After supervising the boys at the loudest, longest lunchtime it felt like they’d ever had, I got some time to myself during nap/quiet time. I thought for sure this would help, but I quickly realized that being alone with my twitchy fingers and nauseous stomach only made me more aware of how much my entire head hurt. I looked over at the coffeemaker longingly before struggling on with the book I was reading.

By dinner time, my head pounded, the boys bounced off the walls of the apartment, the kitchen still hadn’t gotten cleaned, and the trash bag full of wet items from the toddler’s “bath” predicted a long Sunday at the laundromat. Only coffee could save me, I sighed.

That thought pulled me up short. Coffee could save me? The miserable truth finally occurred to me: I had whined about coffee all day, but I hadn’t thought about Jesus once. During all the day’s poor choices (mostly mine) and self-pity (all mine), all of them connected to my chosen penance, I had not prayed a single time.

I hadn’t been participating in a Lenten fast; I was merely detoxing.

I remember every smell of that dinner and color in that room, because it was in that moment I learned what a fast is meant to produce: a conversion to Jesus. At that table I realized why fasting from coffee was a good sacrifice for me and it wasn’t to prove that I was strong, it was to show me my weakness.

It was more than that, too. Yes, I finally woke up out of my selfish preoccupation and acknowledged the desert of my heart. But I also found Jesus was already there, in the desert, waiting for me.

He goes to the desert for us.

We read a long passage today from the Gospel of Mark where Jesus undergoes temptation by the Evil One. But we know Jesus can’t be tempted away from God. Jesus can’t ever be tested in a way that leads to His defeat. He’s the Son of God. So, what’s the point?

The point is us. He is there in the desert to be with us in our temptations and tests. He goes to the desert to fight for us because we can’t win this fight by ourselves.

In Story of a Soul, St. Thérèse of Lisieux demonstrates that it’s possible to go to Heaven through a Little Way. Although very familiar with the spiritual teachings of her fellow Carmelite St. Teresa of Avila, who describes the slow and meticulous climb of the Christian as we rid ourselves of all our flaws, Thérèse suggests another option for herself and for us.

Instead of the tireless and effortful ascent to perfection, Thérèse believes Christ will achieve her salvation as she sits, helplessly surrendered to His movement, as though she is in an elevator. She explains, “I wanted to find an elevator which would raise me to Jesus, for I am too small to climb the rough stairway of perfection…The elevator which must raise me to heaven is Your arms, O Jesus! And for this I had no need to grow up, but rather I had to remain little and become this more and more.”1 Thérèse realizes she won’t gain Heaven through her own effort, but in Christ’s effort on her behalf. Christ is the elevator out of our desert.

Here we are again in the early days of the Lenten season. I usually pick smaller fasts now. But these first few days of Lent, no matter how small the sacrifice, I find myself confronted with the desert and disliking it. It’s hot here and uncomfortable and the thing I’ve sacrificed waits just a screen or a pantry drawer away. But if I’m little enough, if I trust enough, I’ll meet Jesus here in the desert waiting for me. Here I learn how to wait for His arms, just like an elevator, to take me to Heaven.

Readings for the First Sunday of Lent (Year C) on the USCCB Website