Making in the Wilderness

A #Lent26 Reflection

Lent is typically associated with giving things up. Fasting, restraint, silence, and repentance are stalwarts of a season that leads us into the wilderness with Jesus Christ, where distractions fall away (hopefully) and we face what is real.

At first glance, creativity might seem out of place in such a holy season. Creativity feels like abundance. Lent feels like austerity. Creativity feels expressive. Lent feels restrained.

But the wilderness is actually one of the most creative places in the spiritual life.

Throughout Scripture, God does some of His most profound work in barren places. The wilderness strips life down to essentials. There are fewer comforts, fewer illusions, fewer ways to hide. What remains is raw and honest. And it is precisely from that rawness that something new emerges.

In Lent, creativity becomes less about producing and more about listening.

Many of us think creativity begins with ideas, when it really begins with awareness. It begins with seeing what is actually there and learning to see what others don’t see. Lent trains our attention. When we fast from noise, excess, and constant stimulation, we begin to notice things we normally overlook like the quiet movement of grace, the subtle ways God is shaping us, and the hidden beauty in ordinary moments.

This kind of awareness is creative soil.

The opening lines of Book of Genesis describe the earth as “formless and void.” Creation begins not with perfection but with emptiness. God moves into that emptiness and begins forming, shaping, separating light from darkness.

Artists understand this rhythm. Every blank page, empty canvas, or silent room begins in a kind of formlessness. Something must be surrendered before something new can take shape.

Lent teaches us how to live inside that space without rushing to fill it.

In a culture that constantly demands productivity, Lent gently asks us to pause. It reminds us that creativity is not merely about producing; it is about transformation. Sometimes the most important creative work God does is not through our hands but within our hearts.

The desert prepares us.

The forty days of fasting and testing described in the Gospels were not the end of the story for Jesus Christ. They were preparation for ministry. The wilderness clarified His purpose, strengthened His resolve, and deepened His dependence on the Father.

1 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted there by the devil. ² For forty days and forty nights he fasted and became very hungry.

³ During that time the devil came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread.”

⁴ But Jesus told him, “No! The Scriptures say,

‘People do not live by bread alone,
    but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

⁵ Then the devil took him to the holy city, Jerusalem, to the highest point of the Temple, ⁶ and said, “If you are the Son of God, jump off! For the Scriptures say,

‘He will order his angels to protect you.
And they will hold you up with their hands
    so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.’”

⁷ Jesus responded, “The Scriptures also say, ‘You must not test the Lord your God.’”

⁸ Next the devil took him to the peak of a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. ⁹ “I will give it all to you,” he said, “if you will kneel down and worship me.”

¹⁰ “Get out of here, Satan,” Jesus told him. “For the Scriptures say,

‘You must worship the Lord your God
    and serve only him.’”

¹¹ Then the devil went away, and angels came and took care of Jesus.

Matthew 4:1-11 NLT

The same is true for us.

During Lent, creativity might take the form of prayer rather than production. It might look like journaling instead of publishing, sketching instead of exhibiting, or noticing instead of announcing. These quiet practices are not lesser forms of creativity, but its foundation.

In this season, we are invited to create space. Space for reflection. Space for repentance. Space for God to shape something new within us.

Humility is the deepest connection between Lent and creativity. Both require patience. Both require trust that something meaningful can emerge from what at first appears empty.

The wilderness is not wasted ground.

It is the place where God begins again.

Until my next post…

Be salty, stay lit.

Rainer Bantau —The Devotional Guy™

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