February is rapidly coming to a close, and the first signs of spring are starting to appear across the landscape. Warmer air moves in and the snow that’s been our constant companion since mid-November is disappearing. Left beneath this slushy mix is a solid sheet of ice.

Shoveling fresh snow, especially powder, is easy. It was my first season using a snow blower, and in just a few minutes I had a walkable path. Even cleaning up the walkway was easy. Today, after a full day of sun and above-freezing temperatures, the snow was wet and heavy. I spent half an hour clearing off my back patio, trying to take away the insulation preserving the ice below.

At the base now remains thick ice. It’s harder work to remove. First comes the aggressive chopping, followed by the heavy lifting of the broken ice. No snow blower can help me, and if I want the ice gone now, I have to do the hard work to break it, lift it, and chuck it.

So, too, our spiritual lives.

When we choose to tackle sin, we encounter the same layers. The top layer is the easy sins, those which we only commit out of convenience. We’re no gossip, but with that one friend, it just happens. That’s easy to address. As we move away the top layer of snow and see what lies beneath it, it becomes clear how much more work we have to do.

Next come the more difficult sins, those that have been with us for too long. They’ve burrowed in deep, but with focused attention and hard work, we can shovel them to the side. It’s a heavy lift and a hard shove, but they’ll yield to our work. Only then can we see the reality of what needs our attention next.

In the end, we reach our calcified character flaws; those sins to which we’re naturally disposed. We have to hack, attack, lift, and throw to get those out of our lives. It’s a task more easily done when the sunlight and warmth help us.

At the end of it all, we have a clean slate. Though it could be more perfect, the evidence of our good work is before us. This is the work that we undertake in Lent. It’s easy to clean out the cobwebs on the surface. How hard are we willing to work, how deep are we willing to clean, to let the sunlight shine in our lives?