29 March 2022
Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent
Many Jews customarily faced the temple in Jerusalem when they prayed (1 Kings 8:33). In order to facilitate the prayer of the congregation, entire synagogues would be built facing the Jerusalem temple. The early Christians, as their own forms of worship evolved, began facing a different direction: the East, the direction of the rising sun, to symbolize their hope in the glorious return of Christ. They built their churches, too, facing the same direction, in order to facilitate the prayer of the congregation.
In fact, the Jewish temple in Jerusalem, before it was destroyed, itself faced East. The prophet Ezekiel had a vision of the temple in which he saw water flowing out of the facade toward the East (Ezek 47:1). This means that if we orient ourselves, if we look with hope for the coming of Christ, then water will come out of us. As Jesus put it: “whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14).
Lenten discipline extends to the training of our hopes. What do we hope for? If we invest all of our hopes in this present world, then we, perhaps by accident, have no hope for the next world, for the day of judgment, for the second coming of Christ, for the forgiveness of sins, for eternal beatitude with God and the angels and saints. Worldly hopes do have their place, for example, hoping for a pay raise, but we must not let them overshadow our hope in God. Lent is a time to reorient ourselves to face toward the East, toward the rising sun. It is a time to hope for what is best and greatest, the coming of God’s kingdom, and to discover, perhaps in an unexpected way, springs of water welling up in us even to eternal life.