February 2022

Last year, the Lent season began around the 1-year-anniversary of the onset of a global pandemic. This year, the Lent season begins alongside an eruption of violence and chaos in the country of Ukraine that has ripple effects worldwide. Both situations (and all of the others that have happened in between) pull us out of our normal routines and force us to look both inward and outward. Janel Cubbage, a psychotherapist and Bloomberg Fellow with Johns Hopkins, recently tweeted: Respectfully, after the last two years I think we’re beyond the “is anyone else having trouble concentrating with everything going on” phase and need to be asking why we’re upholding a culture that expects us to carry on business as usual. Lent is historically a season to focus on suffering, confession, fasting, and prayer. It's a season when we're supposed to...

Vanessa Myers always finds ways to help kids connect with God's Word, and The Bible Food Truck does exactly that! I love this food-truck-themed devotion for kids that invites them to dig into the Bible. There are 75 devotions total that focus on Bible verses that talk about food, drink, or fasting, starting in Genesis and working through both the Old and New Testaments. Each devotion is straightforward and simple enough for kids to digest, but also deep enough to give them something to chew on and apply. The action steps at the end of each devotional help kids take their faith to go and make it applicable in their everyday lives. These ideas help kids not just read Scripture but put it into action too. The overarching project of creating your own food truck is such a fun way to tie all of the devotions together, and what a great goal for kids to...

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Lent is the Christian season, beginning on Ash Wednesday and ending with Holy Week, that encourages believers to pray, fast, and serve as a way to prepare their hearts for the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The ultimate goal of Lent is to draw closer to God. Much like Advent prepares our hearts for Christmas, Lent prepares our hearts for Easter. Not all Christian traditions place the same emphasis on Lent. I never observed Lent growing up, and 99% of what I know about Lent, I've learned as an adult. I have friends who take the season very seriously with daily devotions and family-wide fasting, and I have other friends who don't really pay much attention until Holy Week. At our current church, we host an Ash Wednesday service, our pastor leads us through a Lenten series each Sunday leading up...