Lent & the Church Calendar

Lent & the Church Calendar

Why bother with any of this?

Written by Dan McDonald

 

Ash Wednesday is the first day of Lent in the Roman Catholic and the Anglican or Episcopalian church calendars.  I am writing this article to fellow Evangelicals and Protestants who regard the use of a Christian church calendar with suspicion.  I can recognize that many Protestants can look at such a practice and smell Roman Catholicism as if everything evil can be described simply by describing something as Roman Catholic.  I wish to use this article to set forth three things.  First, it is quite likely that some of the earliest Christians used a Christian calendar based on a Jewish calendar that existed prior to the beginnings of the Christian era.  Secondly, I would like to show how the Christian calendar was used especially in the weekly observance of Holy Communion to highlight the central events of Christ’s life, ministry and teachings.  Thirdly I would like to suggest that this practice was used by God to help form Christian cultures wherever this practice took root.  Finally I would like to emphasize that my goal is not so much to change existing practices in Christian worship, or to make uniform the present diverse practices of Christian churches, but simply to encourage understanding among differing Christians so that seeing a Christian worshipping differently from what you are accustomed will not lead you to necessarily view that believer or his church with suspicion.  I think we live in a time when we as Christians know that our churches are divided by various practices and so the first step towards greater Christian unity is simply to understand what is the motive and thinking behind those with very different practices from our own.  May God grant us grace to differentiate between those differences that must be regarded as improper and not in accordance with Christ’s Gospel, and those differences that can be tolerated as it is recognized that God is worshipped in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit in spirit and truth.

Church calendars appear to have been used throughout the Christian church at a very early time in Christian history.  We can think of the ancient Christian churches and almost always there was a Christian calendar.  That was true of the Latin Church centered in Rome, the Eastern Orthodox churches, but also churches outside of the Roman Empire such as the churches of Armenia and Georgia in the Caucasus Mountains, and the early Irish Church that did so much to evangelize the British Isles.  The churches in Egypt known as the Coptic churches have had church calendars throughout their history.  Some of those involved in these traditions would suggest that the Apostles taught the churches to have calendars.  From a Protestant perspective that is not something capable of being proven from Scriptures.  But perhaps we can come up with a reasonable theory as to why the early church might have very quickly adopted something of a church calendar to guide the worship of the early Christian church.

The early church may have begun celebrating certain Christian events in conjunction with the preceding Jewish worship calendar.  Here is how that would work.  We know from the Scriptures that Christianity was first proclaimed in the synagogues.  St. Paul sought wherever he went to preach the Gospel to proclaim the Gospel first to Jews and then to Gentiles.  The early church was rooted in historic Judaism.  The Jewish religion had a calendar for observance of holy days.  As Christians began practicing their Christian faith within a Jewish context it would be natural for Christians to begin focusing on the events of Christ’s life that were seen naturally in the Jewish calendar.  Perhaps the first two Jewish holy days to be given a Christian understanding by Christians not yet fully separated from Judaism were the Passover and Pentecost.  Both of these holy days were Jewish in origin.  But both of them had strong connections to the life and ministry of Christ.  It was during Passover that Christ was crucified, died for our sins, was buried, and then rose from the dead on Easter Sunday.  As Christians tried to use the Jewish calendar before Christians were wholly separated from Judaism, Christians began proclaiming Christ as the Passover.  Pentecost came fifty days after Passover, and the Holy Spirit did a remarkable thing on the first Pentecost celebration following Christ’s resurrection from the dead.  The Holy Spirit came upon the church as Christ empowered his apostles and his new church with the power of the Holy Spirit to advance the cause of the Gospel.  It was thus natural for Christians to begin highlighting how in between Christ’s resurrection during Passover and the gift of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost that Christ lingered for forty days teaching and appearing before the disciples and then how he ascended on the fortieth day, and then how the Holy Spirit was given at Pentecost, the fiftieth day after Christ’s resurrection.  So Christians began recognizing Passover with the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ; and the next forty days as the days of the risen Christ’s lingering upon earth, the ascension on the fortieth day, and Pentecost on the fiftieth day.

Judaism had celebrated in the darkest time of the year, the festival of Chanukah, also known as the Festival of Lights.  There had been very little oil on an occasion to keep the temple candles lit, but instead of the candles burning out they miraculously burned for eight entire days.  Christians seeing Christ as the Light of the World, and as the one who filled the temple began to see Christ as the embodiment of Chanukah.  He was proclaimed as the Light come into the world.  The gaps of the newly emerging Christian calendar were filled with a string of events that highlighted Christ’s life and ministry.  There was an advent season remembering how God’s people throughout the Old Testament had waited for Christ’s coming and how New Testament Christians also continue to wait for Christ’s return.  The fulfillment of Christ’s coming is celebrated in the birth of Christ on Christmas Day.  Afterwards, it was essential that God made manifest who Christ was in a season known as Epiphany.  The season before we observe Christ’s death and resurrection during the Passover is that of Christ’s own preparation for the work he had to do on earth.  He consecrated himself to his calling of ministry and sacrifice in the forty days in the wilderness; days of fasting and prayer.  The early church knew we could not duplicate Christ’s forty day fast, but Christians began to enter into a period of humbling themselves, seeking repentance, and seeking to consecrate themselves for lives of service in and unto Christ.  Lent began to be practiced both as a way of expressing gratitude for Christ’s work on our behalf, and as a way of committing ourselves unto the faith, humility, and repentance to which Christ has called us and which can be obtained only thorough a prayerful dependence upon Him.  The first half of the Christian year is focused on these highlighted aspects of Christ’s life and ministry.

In the second half of the Christian year, the focus is set upon consideration of how the Christian is meant to be fruitful in yielding the fruit of the Holy Spirit in accordance with the teachings of our Lord Jesus Christ.  These emphases are especially the focus of the weekly ministry of the Church in the giving and partaking of Holy Communion.

I can almost hear a Christian minister from a Protestant tradition begin to say, “Well I prefer to preach through books of the Holy Scriptures instead of a church calendar.”  I suspect the Church Fathers might have responded by asking why anyone would want to get rid of one manner of teaching when both ways can be presented.  The church calendar was especially applied to the weekly practice of Holy Communion.  In the observance of the Holy Communion it was understood that the preaching of the Word to precede the participation of the church in the Holy Communion was to be focused on the event at hand, wherein the church body partook of Christ’s body and blood by the Spirit of God.  How exactly that is to be explained is something I refuse to do.   It seems to me that to try to explain what exactly happens when we partake of the sacrament Christ commanded us to take leads not to the edification of the church but the dividing of brethren.  The early church while meeting on Sunday did not neglect the teaching of the word on other days of the week, and in other kinds of services.  The practice of the early church, wherever possible, was to open the church for the sake of praying and the teaching God’s word with morning and evening services known as Matins and Vespers.  The early Church, and the Church Fathers, often used such times to exegete the Scriptures in a careful manner and within their Biblical context.  Part of the genius of the early Church was to recognize the need to apply the Scriptures to people varied in their Christian walk.  The weak brother was not taxed by overly long sermons in Holy Communion and the brother especially interested in growth was not neglected by limiting the Word proclaimed to the short homily expressed in conjunction with Holy Communion.  The Church had a variety of services offered to meet a variety of needs within a Christian church.  There does not need to be a neglect of teaching the Scriptures while presenting the church calendar.

The use of the Church calendar likely helped grow Christian cultures in the nations where this practice became the general rule.  The leaders of a united church, in the early days of a church selected passages and themes to be expressed on the days when Holy Communion was being served.  Imagine the benefits of Christians learning the same Scriptures emphasizing the life, ministry, and teaching of Christ in conjunction with the weekly practice of Holy Communion.  A whole nation of Christians would be able to speak intelligently of the Scripture passages used in the third week of Epiphany or in the First Sunday in Lent, or from Pentecost Sunday.  Christians having a common focus in their weekly Holy Communion services could then connect that to the varied teachings they were hearing in the Scripture teachings from other morning and evening services.  Diversity of weekly teachings could be connected to the shared the passages and themes used in the Holy Communion services.  This helped forge a foundation of common themes expressed in an entire culture.

I have tried to set these things forth not to say this is what each and every modern church should try to do.  That has not been my goal.  My goal is much simpler.  We live in a generation when Christians are divided.  Part of this division is caused when people seeing different practices than those in their own church begin to believe that one practice has to be right and the other has to be wrong.  But sometimes we need to remember that John the Baptist and his disciples participated in fasting and did not drink wine; whereas Christ and his disciples did not fast and did drink wine.  Was one practice holy and the other not holy?  No both were accepted by God in their faith.  So my goal is fairly simple.  For those who are surprised when a Christian brother keeps a church calendar, just recognize that his practice is a long tradition of the church and need not be offensive against God and the gospel.  As for those of us who use the church calendar, let us not judge our brethren who differ from us but recognize that it is our great enemy who divides us against each other and it is our Lord who by the Spirit prays for each of us and teaches us to love the brethren.