“Quite Time, Devotion, or Lent?”

As we think about worshipping God, becoming mature, and carrying Christ’s love to the world one of the ways we do that is through spiritual disciplines. What is a spiritual discipline? Well, in the last several years in the context of WBC the most popular spiritual discipline has become bible reading. Some might call this discipline a daily devotion or quite time. Another discipline that we may take part in from time to time is prayer. Are these the only two spiritual disciplines that the bible talks about? No way. The bible also speaks about other disciplines such as fasting, and Sabbath keeping. What is the purpose of practicing a spiritual discipline? Well, there are many, but mostly the purpose of participating in these things is to help point out your sin so that we can grow closer to God. Do you have daily devotions? Are they cumbersome for you? Hopefully you do participate in devoting time each day to read the bible and hopefully it is not a burden for you. The Psalmist cries out to God many times in the book of Psalms of his great love for the word of God and how he delights in it. As we think about our desire of devoting time to read God’s word how are we doing? Do you delight in it? How are you doing practicing other disciplines like fasting? Do you think that there may be things that God would like to point out to you about yourself and your relationship to Him that could from fasting? This month’s theme for Ignite of experiencing the life of the resurrection in the context of the death may be best celebrated through the discipline of fasting. Throughout history the church has attempted to celebrate Easter in this way by practicing fasting during the 40 days of Lent that come before Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and ultimately Resurrection Sunday. The word Lent comes from a German word for “springtime.” The 40 days of Lent in the Christian calendar recall the 40 days of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. Since the fourth century A.D., the Church has observed Lent as a time of “spring cleaning for the soul.” During this season, we imitate Jesus’ withdrawal into the wilderness for 40 days. We focus on Christ’s battle with Satan that he waged in order to win our salvation. And we think about our temptations and sins and repent. Lent is a time to evaluate ourselves in light of God’s Word, to abandon sin, and to receive God’s forgiveness and strength. Lent has been called the season of “Bright Sadness” because it is a time of both celebration and mourning. The spiritual discipline of fasting is highlighted during Lent. Jesus Christ practice fasting during His time on earth. Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. (Matthew 4:1) Every time Jesus responds to the three temptations of the devil in the wilderness, he quotes from Deuteronomy. “Man shall not live by bread alone but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Deuteronomy 8:3); “You shall not tempt the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 6:16); and “You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve” (Deuteronomy 6:13). Moses is speaking to Israel about their time of testing in the wilderness. Look at Deuteronomy 8:2-3 and mark the parallels between Israel in the wilderness and Jesus in the wilderness: “You shall remember all the ways which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness [as Jesus was led by the Spirit in the wilderness] these forty years [as Jesus was there forty days], that He might humble you, testing you [as Jesus was “tested”], to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. And He humbled you and let you be hungry [as Jesus was made hungry by his fasting], and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.” (Deuteronomy 8:2-3) God obviously intends a parallel between Jesus and the people of Israel in the wilderness. Jesus endured His “wilderness experience” to contrast that of Israel and to show us how to negotiate ours. How can we keep our eyes on the prize, avoid moral failures, and honor Christ with the fruit of obedient lives? By following in the footsteps of The Master. Lent is the Church’s annual “wilderness experience” with Christ. He went to the desert, so may be we should too. Certainly, experiencing this would had some beauty to our Easter celebration by placing it in its proper context. So, to answer the question “Quite Time, Devotion, or Lent?” Its not an either or. The answer is “all of the above and more”. Our view of spiritual disciplines has to be bigger that just one of these things and hopefully as we practice these things our hunger and desire for God will grow along with our desire to practice the disciplines that He has given to bring us closer to Him.