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Today starts another season of preparing to celebrate Easter.  Over the years, we’ve built into our family an atmosphere of “Easter Week”.  We let each person pick a day, and then pick something special/celebratory for our family to do on that day the week after Easter.  But so far, we’ve not done a ton for the Lent season beyond having them relinquish a toy that they usually forget about by the time Easter rolls around anyways.  I love the season of Advent, as our family prepares together for celebrating Christmas.  So this year, we’ll be going through “A Family Journey With Jesus Through Lent” by Angela Burrin.

So far it looks pretty cool.  There are stories from scripture for each day of Lent, and they’re told from the perspective of children nearby.  The only downside is the fact that it seems to be written with a catholic (faith, not “world-wide”) audience in mind.  So there are bits I’ve read about Mary being everyones’ mother, Mass, etc…but with a little pre-reading/editing, it’s definitely still very usable.

You may especially like it if you’re hip to the “Jesus Calling” books.  Each days devotional thought ends with a few words from Jesus to your child.  Now you’re probably all like “Dang, Chadwick….why didn’t you tell me this a month ago?”  Well, it’s because we just got the books today, and I just not checked it out a bit.  So….maybe get it for next year?

Another book we’re using as a guide (though I’m trusting my wife to handle this one on our behalf) is one on the “Daniel Fast”.  Not that we believe God sent a prophetic word to us, guiding us toward such a thing.  But we both could use (me mainly) healthier eating habits, and it’ll be nice to submit to a season of self-denial together – as it draws us to remembering our need for Christ, and self-control.

Last year I did a water-fast, and only lasted 12 days…although it was definitely a rewarding experience on many levels.  This year will hopefully run all the way to Easter, and connect me not only to my Savior, but to my wife as well – always a bonus. 🙂  Who knows, I may also try to add a short jog to my Lenten routine….once a week enough to count? 🙂

Sidenote: I meet regularly with a young woman and young man in jail, awaiting trials.  In conversations with them about Lent (both have a Catholic background), they struggle to know how to handle it.  There aren’t a lot of things they can still “give up”.  It’s been an interesting and thought-provoking reminder of why we make sacrifices, and the heart of humbling ourselves before God – confessing our brokenness, and our need for Him.

Here we go again with another “Five Minute Friday” post!  To learn more about “Five Minute Friday” (FMF), check out the linked image here.  Basically, each week there’s a word given for you to write about.  You start writing, no back-tracking, editing, etc.  At the end of 5 minutes, you stop.  Then you post it, and share in the community of words that were birthed during these 24-ish hours.  It’s cool stuff.
So here’s this week’s response to the word: “ bare  ”

Unfortunate, but true – with today’s culture and accidental access to overly revealing flesh fests (we censored Beyonce at the youth group Superbowl party – poor girl forgot to get dressed for a big concert….), we’ve seen much more of the human body laid “bare” before us than is necessary.  But I remember the first time I saw someone completely bare for the first time in person.

It was my freshman year in college, and I was at a campground with some friends (don’t worry, this isn’t going where you think it might), and we were enjoying a normal night of hanging out.  The attractive guy was playing guitar while the girls were singing, and somewhere in the midst I was poking sticks in the fire.

I’m a ridiculous morning person, especially when camping in a tent.  When the sun comes up, my body follows.   So while my friends stayed groggy in the tents, I wandered down to the lake nearby to talk to a guy who was up fishing earlier than I knew people fished.  That’s when I looked over – there they were.  An entire family – mother, father, kids, all washing themselves completely naked in the handpump in the middle of this campground.

Maybe it was just a fathers’ poor planning, and the family decided to do something silly to encourage their dad.  But it seemed to me, this was a family in need.  A family that was just barely getting by, living in poverty at a campground just outside a major city.

I remember the brokenness of the world I felt in that moment.  I remember what I saw was not simply the nakedness of these human beings…but the nakedness of our world in need.  For one of the first times, even after rough times growing up, real injustice was crying out…uncovered….for all the world to see and hear.

May we live as people willing to see and hear the cries of those laid bare all around us.  May we clothe the naked with justice….

Okay, so I went 6 minutes there.  You’ll have to “bare” with me….haha. (see what I did there?)