Lenten Lessons

I realize Lent is over, and it's way past Easter, but I’m just wondering, did you give up anything as a part of Lent this year?  Again, I wish there were times we could sit down over coffee and discuss what you learned about yourself, about the Lord, about sin, about death, about resurrection…the list would probably be endless.  When I was a child, we always gave up something for Lent – candy, part of our allowance, meat on Friday (but we could eat fish), lying, being mean to our sister…something.  I’m not a strict adherer to Lenten sacrifice these days, but I did decide to give up something this season.  Here goes…I gave up (drum roll) stepping on the scales.  I decided I was getting more addicted to the numbers on the scale than I was to just simply being healthy.  It’s amazing how three little numbers can ruin or make one’s day, and affirm or devalue one’s significance.  These are things I chat with high school and college girls about all the time, yet even at my age, it can still be a struggle.  So, I decided to give it up for Lent.  Here’s what happened.

The temptation to weigh myself grew greater and stronger.

The desire to eat more unhealthily grew greater and stronger.

…and I began to realize, as I gave into both temptations, not just once, mind you, that the very thing I wanted to do, I didn’t do.  The very thing I didn’t want to do, I did.  Oh my goodness, there is still flesh inside of me, and it is powerful.  And, when the law has been established, law wins…and law is death.   Will I continue in sin (?) - that's the million $ question... So, what's the answer?

Hmm…sounds a bit like Paul in Romans (Have you noticed we’ve been in Romans a lot over the last few weeks? That would be because it’s where I’m spending my mornings in quiet time.  Take note that this isn’t me trying to write a commentary on Romans.  I’m simply sharing what I’m learning and how relevant the Word is for EVERY DAY!).  Here are some snippets of what Paul says (though I have skipped around, please read them as if they were in context):

For the good I wish to do, I do not do; but I practice the very evil that I do not wish.  But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me (Romans 7:19-20).

I would not have come to know sin except through the Law (7:7)…

Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?  Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!  So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin (7:24-25).

For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did; sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh (8:3).

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.  For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace (8:5-6).

We are under no obligation to the flesh, to live according to the flesh (8:12)…

For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.  Now if we have died with Christ, we shall also live with Him (6:6-8)…

So now present your bodies as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification (6:19b)…

The Scripture speaks for itself, doesn’t it?  Lent – a reminder of the Law, that none of us can keep (as if I need a reminder).  Lent - a great picture of the Romans 7 problem.  However, it doesn't just rear it's head during a particular time of year.  Every day, there's a sign of the old me; but praise the Lord, there is a way to find victory... My sacrifice for Lent was, in and of itself, motivated by a good thing.  Yet it turned to a difficult thing when it became a regulation.  What I need to remind myself is that every good thing can become a Law of Death if it is micromanaged with a wrong motive.  Why would I not want to weigh myself?  Not because it was "evil," but because my focus was unhealthy.  However, the weigh-in became a standard of comparison.  That standard robbed me of my joy, and sin abounded. 

Victory is found in daily living in the reminder that I am DEAD to those things I don't want to do which are a part of the law of sin & the flesh (leading to slavery), AND that I am ALIVE to choices that lead to freedom and result in Spirit-filled righteousness.  I am DEAD! yet ALIVE in JESUS!

What shall we say then?  Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? May it never be (6:1)!

For there is, therefore, now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (8:1)!

Is not the Christian life full of excitement?  There are no words adequate enough to proclaim!  Jesus thought of everything.  The gospel is, indeed, an every day gospel.