Lent

“What are you giving up for Lent?”

               You’ve probably been asked this question. Even people who do not attend church are familiar with this practice of Lent, the practice of “giving something up” for 40 days. According to Biblegateway.com, here are the Top 10 things that people have tweeted or posted that they will be giving up for Lent in 2015:

1. School (11,330 tweets)
2. Chocolate (8,916)
3. Smoking (8,171)
4. Swearing (6,733)
5. Alcohol (5,820)
6. Soda (5,087)
7. Social networking (4,087)
8. Sweets (3,860)
9. Fast food (3,830)
10. Meat (2,687)

While some of the items on the list, such as smoking and fast food, can have a definite positive long term health and financial benefit, other items on the list, such as giving up school, are probably not practical and probably not for the right reasons.

So let’s start here, why do we have a custom of giving up various foods, habits, or actions for this 40 day period? Lent began as a practice of the early Christian Church (Lent is not mentioned in the Bible) as a way to prepare people in their faith journey to join the church and live a life of Christian discipleship. This 40 day period of time began on Ash Wednesday, and ended on Easter Sunday, at which time the new church members were baptized. As part of Lent these new members would learn and study important doctrines of the faith and study Scriptures. During this time there were many social and recreational things that they gave up, but more importantly they were taking on something new, taking on learning and growing in the new life that they were coming into.

So, from this practice, began the concept of giving up items for Lent to use our resources and time on things that really matter for the Kingdom of Heaven. We also in a small way experience an aspect of fasting and self-denial, through which we can (should) spend more time in prayer and thanksgiving as we think about the life and teachings, death and resurrection, of Jesus.

But I’m not going to ask you to give up chocolate or Facebook for 40 days, but I am going to ask you if you will take a Lenten journey with me. Take a journey through Scriptures like so many have done before us, as a way to prepare ourselves for the amazing Easter story. Here is a Lenten devotion of Scriptures that we can use together to read during the 40 days (not including Sundays) of Lent this year.

Day 1: John 1:1-18       

Day 2:  Matthew 3:13-17         

Day 3:  Matthew 4:1-11

Day 4: John 1:29-50     

Day 5:  Mark 1:1-20                 

Day 6:  Luke 5:1-11

Day 7:  Mark 1:29-39   

Day 8:  Matthew 4:23-25

Day 9:  Mark 1:40-45

Day 10: Luke 5:17-26

Day 11: Matthew 9:9-13

Day 12: John 4:1-42

Day 13: Mark 3:1-6

Day 14: Luke 6:17-26

Day 15: Luke 6:27-43

Day 16: Matthew 6:1-34

Day 17: Matthew 7:1-28

Day 18: John 7:31-8:11

Day 19: Luke 7:1-28

Day 20: Mark 5:21-43

Day 21: Matthew 13:3-23

Day 22: Mark 6:31-46

Day 23: Matthew 14: 22-46

Day 24: Mark 9: 14-29

Day 25: Luke 9:46-50

Day 26: Matthew 18:15-20

Day 27: John 9:1-41

Day 28: John 10:1-21

Day 29: Luke 10:25-37

Day 30: Luke 10:38-11:13

Day 31: Luke 12:22-48

Day 32: Matthew 11:20-30

Day 33: Luke 7: 36-8:3

Day 34: Matthew 16:13-17:8

Day 35: Mark 10:17-31

Day 36: Luke 15:11-32

Day 37: Matthew 20:1-16

Day 38: Luke 19:1-10

Day 39: Mark 6:1-13

Day 40: John 11

Have a blessed Lenten season. If you choose to give something up, use the money you save to help a local non-profit this year. If you give up an activity take the time you save to meditate in prayer. And allow God to work in and through you this season, to live into a Holy Lent.