Things To Give Up For Lent

Ash Wednes­day marks the begin­ning of Lent. Much of the Chris­t­ian world sym­bol­i­cally shares in Jesus’ Forty Days of Temp­ta­tion by giv­ing some­thing up. It is a way of iden­ti­fy­ing with one of the Lord’s cen­tral expe­ri­ences (Bap­tism, Com­mu­nion, Prayer, and Com­pas­sion­ate Actions, are the most prac­ticed other ways). It is inter­est­ing that Lent comes along about the time that the New Year’s res­o­lu­tions have been dropped and pretty much for­got­ten. We humans would like to feel like we have the spir­i­tual abil­ity to rise above our phys­i­cal nature. The task is much harder than we real­ize. How­ever, the chal­lenge is what makes great ath­letes, artists, and saints.

Most peo­ple focus on Jesus’ going with­out food for forty days. We give up a favorite food (usu­ally some­thing sweet or really fat­ten­ing), and we are glad to go back to it after Easter. That is not a bad thing to do at all. Per­son­ally, I like to go a lit­tle deeper into the Temp­ta­tion story and give up some­thing a lit­tle more sig­nif­i­cant. Over­all, giv­ing up foods of var­i­ous kinds and amounts is some­thing I have prac­ticed all through life (due to a his­tory of stom­ach ail­ments). The last few years I have been turn­ing my focus to what Paul called “the prin­ci­pal­i­ties and powers” — these are the evil things that make the world turn in its sor­did ways. They have to do with many of the infe­rior social dynam­ics. Many of those infe­rior dynam­ics are con­sid­ered almost sacred by sheer habit.

Here is a way to take on some of those lesser ways of exist­ing: give up neg­a­tiv­ity; dump the judg­men­tal habits; stop talk­ing about other peo­ple; quit look­ing out­side of your­self for solu­tions; stop whin­ing for forty days; give up the com­pul­sion to cri­tique and con­trol; give your favorite media pro­gram a rest; ignore bad news; tip wait­ers and wait­resses the amount that you would oth­er­wise spend — now that you have cut back on how much you order; take a break from mind­less spend­ing; place a mora­to­rium on worry, fear, anx­i­ety, and the other sloppy spir­i­tual habits that chip away at faith; drop rou­tine mind­less sto­ries; stop hid­ing behind excuses; be the man or woman you are designed to be. For forty days, give up what Jesus resisted: cheap suc­cess schemes (shal­low pop­u­lar­ity, wow­ing peo­ple, pyra­mid tac­tics of power, etc.).

Have some­thing to show for Lent this year. Make it a com­bi­na­tion of things. Go about it with some energy and deter­mi­na­tion. Truly share the whole type of expe­ri­ence that Jesus had. Tokenism may be a start, but it has lit­tle reward. Go the dis­tance. Make it an expe­ri­ence that you will never for­get — one that actu­ally changes you.