DAY 2 — THE SANDCASTLE IN THE TIDE

“Letting Go of What Cannot Last”

A father and his little daughter spent an entire afternoon building a magnificent sandcastle —
towers tall, windows carved perfectly,
a moat filled with water from the sea.

When they finally stepped back to admire it,
the tide began to rise.
Wave after wave pressed forward
until the castle slowly dissolved into wet sand.

The girl’s eyes filled with tears.
“We worked so hard!
Why did it have to disappear?”

Her father picked her up and said,
“We didn’t build it to last forever.
We built it to enjoy…
and to learn that even beautiful things
sometimes have to return to the sea.”

He set her down.
“Now come —
let’s build again.”

Lent teaches us the art of holy letting go.
So much of what we cling to —
status, achievements, comfort, control, expectations —
is just a sandcastle.

It looks beautiful,
but it was never meant to last forever.
God often allows certain structures in our lives
to be washed away
so He can free us from what we cling to
and make space for something deeper.

The tide is not your enemy.
It is God’s invitation
to hold life with open hands.
To stop worshiping what is temporary.
To trust that God knows how to rebuild
with better foundations.

The spiritual life is not about preserving sandcastles —
it’s about learning to start again
with a freer heart.