Thursday, February 26, 2009

Lent is here!

Had a good time of refreshment and energizing at church last night for Ash Wednesday.

I had decided that for Lent I was going to give up a meal a day. There are multiple facets to my decision, but at the heart of it is that I am a guy who 'never misses a meal.' I spend a lot of time each day thinking about what my next meal is going to be and I have felt God saying for a while now that He needed to become my portion. I need to hunger for Him.

So at worship last night the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness was one of the texts and "Man can not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God" was Jesus' first response to Satan.

I do not really know if I know what it means for God to be my sustenance, my portion, my manna. So this Lenten journey is a plea for God to enter my life in that way.

I also want to begin a movement of solidarity with the people of Kenya who are enduring famine right now. Even when there is no famine, many are hungry. I want to enter into that reality a little bit, though not even remotely close to what they endure daily.

I hope that you take this tradition of Lent seriously and find some way to draw closer to God. What are you surrendering to God or adding to your journey with him for Lent?

1 comment:

Tiffany said...

Hey Ben! =)

First of all, I agree with your comment about Ash Wednesday service being 'energizing,' though I still think we should have stayed standing. I'm blaming you for that, though. =p

For Lent, I'm giving up all snacks and sticking to three meals a day. Andrew and I are also fasting on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I know a large part of the Bible study group is fasting on Thursdays.