I love the journey of Lent and the joy of Easter. If you adopted some form of discipline during this season of repentance and reflecting on Christ’s passion, I pray that God has blessed you richly.
Personally, mine has been a bit of a roller coaster ride. I chose to work on two things: praising God and resting. In terms of praising God, I have been spending prayer time in my prayer closet everyday and write out prayers of praise as part of that devotional time. Specifically, for my prayers I have been beginning with telling God I Love Him, honoring God for who God is, and honoring God for what God does.
Working at this for almost 40 days now has been an extremely enriching experience. At first my prayers felt a bit forced and contrived. Next, they seemed to flow effortlessly. A few times I felt words were just far too inadequate and found myself moving into song. Yes, I actually was sitting in my prayer closet singing. Then there were days where I was moved by God’s presence to just sitting quietly before the Lord. As I wrap things up though now I am finding myself pondering more deeply the reality of God because my words are beginning to seem far too repetitive. Now I am back to trying to find the right words. And so…the cycle begins again.
My rest goal was simple–be in bed by 11 p.m. That probably sounds crazy to some of you sound-sleeper-off-to-bed-like-clockwork people, but for someone with a life time of no sleep pattern, that’s huge. I have had a growing sense of how sinful it is to either slough off having a true sabbath or ignore appropriate care of your body.
I have to confess that out of all of the lenten disciples I have ever adopted this is the one I have done the worst on. In fact, I have never not done exactly what I have said I would do for Lent. If I said I would pray an hour a day, by golly I prayed an hour a day. When I said, I would give up driving my car, I road my bicycle, a bus or one time even walked 3 miles home because I missed the bus. No matter how tough it was I did it, but not so with sleep. I will say that I have done tremendously better in general and God has definitely revealed to me just how important sleep is to my spiritual life because I have taken some long draughts over the past 40 days from the well of rest called sleep. This is one discipline I will continue to strive for well past Easter.
I would really love to hear from other people about how their lenten journey has been. Both their struggles and their victories. I would love to know what the Holy Spirit has taught you about yourself, God, and discipleship. So drop a comment below. Let us help one another to live more faithfully.
Speaking of Easter, I hope yours will be a very blessed day. May the joy of the Good News that Jesus Christ is alive reinvigorate your soul. May you hear the old old story with new new ears so that God enlivens your heart and faith anew.