Lent, as a season, is about reflecting, simplifying, cleansing. It’s about searching our hearts, forgiveness, and grace. It’s also about love and freedom and growth.

It’s a time we remember Jesus being tempted in the desert for 40 days (hence the reason Lent is 40 days long), teaching the people about God’s love and how we should love others, breaking bread with his disciples, and living out God’s will for his life.

In Lent, we refocus on the renewing waters of baptism, the cleansing river, the fountain of grace.

Some say that the Sundays in Lent are not counted as part of the 40 days; rather, they are considered celebration days or “little Easters" (source). But I think this is missing the point a little: Lent is a journey, a time of self-reflection and examination of the heart, a time when we invite God in to do the work of shaping us and molding us into His likeness.

It’s a process, and it takes time.

How can we create space for this in worship? How can we make this season more meaningful? How can we capture the quietness, the self-reflection, the invitation to come just as we are in our Lenten services? 

The book of Psalms plays an important role in worship, acting as both a Scripture reading and an act of musical praise. After all, many of the psalms were written as songs. In fact, the word psalm comes the Greek psalmos, meaning "song sung to harp music."

There are many resources available to us today that facilitate singing psalms in worship, including the United Methodist Hymnal (UMH), the Lutheran Book of Common Worship and Book of Common Worship - Daily Prayer, the Anglican Chant Psalter, the Concordia Psalter, and the online Psalter resource, featuring five psalter collections using familiar hymn tunes with recordings and searchable indexes.