Preparing for Lent: Discerning a Lenten Sabbath or Fast

It is hard to believe that Lent is just around the corner. From the posting of this reflection, we only have five days until the season of Lent begins. For many of us, the season comes at a moment that catches us unawares, and when people ask us, “what are you giving up for Lent this year” we find ourselves without a response. Perhaps by the first Sunday of Lent we have stumbled into something that will serve as our Lenten practice so that we can have a response to that question, but it is far more likely that we will fall into a tried and true practice that we have done for years and years because at least we have something to tell others when they ask us about our Lenten practice.

But, I wonder how each our lives would be enriched by taking the next five days to prayerfully consider how a sabbath practice around one thing or another might be a path toward healthier relationships with friends, family, community, or with God. Instead of going with the same Lenten practice that has been done every year for the last 10, 15, 20, 25 years, what might my life be like if I were to take the time to take a deeper look at my life in order to discern a more enriching practice for the coming Lenten season? Here, it might help to have a little bit of guidance as I consider what I am going to fast from during the Lenten season. The word fast might be something that intimidates me, but I can understand a fast to simply be a prolonged sabbath practice for a particular moment in time. Thus, my Lenten fast is a practice of sabbath in a particular way.

Just yesterday, I received a newsletter from the blog Building Faith, which is published by Virginia Theological Seminary. The newsletter contained a lot of helpful information about practicing sabbath and how we might reframe sabbath to be something that could fit within our lives while offering to us the rest we need to live a little more intentionally. The practice of sabbath helps me to grow in relationship if I am doing that practice with intention and with care for the people who are already in my life. If I am practicing my sabbath without regard to the relationships I have with my family, friends, community, creation, and God, then I might need to revisit how I am practicing sabbath in my life. As I practice sabbath, I am hopefully drawn closer to the people I love and the God who loves me.

Today, I am inviting you to spend some time over the next five days to review where you are in life. Where is it that you want to be drawn in closer relationship with others? How might a sabbath practice during the season of Lent be a way for you to fast from one thing in order to be drawn closer to others? How will you share your sabbath practice with the very people with whom you wish to be closer with? When your loved ones, either friends or family, share their Lenten practice, what can you do to be supportive of them as they journey the season of Lent?

I pray that you will spend a little time over the next five days to discern your Lenten practice of sabbath, which you might also call a fast. Take some time to be in prayerful conversation with God and see where God leads you into a fast. Share your fast for Lent with those you love and invite them to share with you their Lenten fast. Then, you can be supportive friends to one another and serve as an accountability partner in the season of Lent.

Lent is coming. Let us take the opportunity to draw closer to each other and to our God.

In Christ,

Hunter+