Ash Wednesday

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday…for many people the first day of Lent. A day of somber remembrance that we are “dust and to dust we shall return”. A day to not only contemplate our mortality but to also have an ash cross placed on our foreheads as a visual reminder.

Many people give things up for Lent. Chocolate, alcohol, potato chips and other food items and sometimes non-food things like, as I have heard some people are doing, Facebook.

I was discussing this with someone this morning and she mentioned that some people put the Hollywood spin on Lent. What does this mean?

You know how you can read a really good book that just sticks with you, that makes you finish it with a sigh that it is actually over, that changes just a little bit of you in a wonderful way. Then you find out that book has been made into a movie. With joy you go and see the movie and it isn’t the book. The characters are wrong, plot twists have been changed and sometimes they change the ending completely. The book has been given the Hollywood spin.

What does this have to do with how people observe Lent? Some people do give up something for Lent but they do it to better themselves and NOT to draw closer to God. And that is the real meaning behind giving something up. To draw closer to God. To recognize the sacrifice that He made by becoming human and suffering and dying. It is to be a discipline that helps us focus on Jesus that culminates on Good Friday. The day we immerse ourselves in the torture and death that Jesus endured for us.

To just give something up for the weeks of Lent and not think about God or do it to become closer to God is to give Lent the Hollywood spin. And that is not why we observe Lent.

So are you giving something up for Lent? If so, why are you doing it?

On a personal note, I am not giving something up. I am doing something. I am being conscious and deliberate in praying. I want to not just pray when I need to or when I am troubled but consciously live my life by praying without ceasing. To always have God at the forefront of my mind. Hopefully this discipline will change my life and it will become a life habit.