LENT and Our Sponsored Kids

I never grew up celebrating or even really knowing about Lent...well, I guess when we lived in Milwaukee you couldn't miss the fish frys that emerged on every restaurant sign in late Winter on Fridays...

However, in the last several years after attending my first Ash Wednesday service at my church and even writing a piece last year for a World Vision student-focused lent curriculum it has become something I think about just like I start thinking about Spring...

I love the notion of seeking to identify with Jesus and the road He traveled leading to the cross and ultimately our celebration of the Resurrection...and as God has broken and rebuilt my heart through my identification and involvement with my friends in Zambia over the last eight years Lent has become something more spiritual and something I feel compelled to try and participate in a tangible way...

I'm going to be re-reading Rich Stearns' fantastic book The Hole in the Gospel during Lent as part of the ACTS group I help lead at Cornerstone with some students concerned deeply about issues of poverty and justice in our world...I long for the Gospel in all its fullness and richness to penetrate my mind, heart, and soul...

And as an activity of remembrance of those who have been thru suffering as Jesus did as the Least I decided to try and not eat anything after dinner for the next 40 days...now that isn't really that big a deal, I know...but for a late night sports junkie (especially in this blasted Eastern time zone!) it will be a bit of a struggle to not nibble on something from the cupboard...

But I felt led to do this because those desserts and snacks represent extra...and as I almost daily think about and pray for Monica and Peter and Gracious and Andrew, our sponsored kids in the village I've traveled to several different years, I know that their meals and their lives don't include extras...extras often consume my life, my family's life, and my culture's lives...and the support we send them monthly may sometimes just provide the basics that are often missing...and as I contemplate sneaking over to grab a snack after 10 pm over the next several weeks, I'm planning to stop and pray for these amazing kids I've gotten to meet and fallen in love with on the other side of the world...praying that they will have breakfast as the sun rises in Zambia on that day and that God will pour out His love and provision in their lives well beyond Easter 2010...

May God give me the strength to enter into their world without extras just in the smallest of ways as I learn to be content and healthy and disciplined and changed in these days leading to Holy Week...

With Hopes Lent Will Be Meaningful for Many of You...