Category / Lent

by Karen Twinem

How to Stop a Downward Thinking Spiral

As the stock market bungee-jumps and fears of the coronavirus intensify, we may find ourselves in a downward thinking spiral. Our thoughts and fears get away from us. Inner peace, joy and calm are gone.

One of the best and most effective ideas I’ve read to stop this comes from Rachael Kable of “The Mindful Kind” book and podcast: Take a deep breathe and name the colors of the things you see.

This distracts the mind and allows us to get back on track. A brief walk is an effective way to start naming colors. A good ending is to express gratitude for the things we have seen.

by Karen Twinem

The Safest Place to Be

Today, millions around the globe are facing a potentially dangerous pandemic. Where’s a safe place to stay?

One famous answer came from Corrie ten Boom, the Dutch Christian who ended up in a Nazi concentration camp for her role in helping almost 800 Jews escape the Germans. She said, “The safest place is in the center of God’s will.”

I agree, but that doesn’t guarantee sunshine and roses for life, as ten Boom well knew. She did God’s will even though it was dangerous and even though she ended up suffering dreadfully for it.

Did she have internal consolation for doing so? Certainly.

Praying to find God’s will in a situation and doing it does bring elements of safety, as well as trouble. It means that the Lord of the universe wants you to succeed. It means that pathways you didn’t expect will appear. It means you can have inner peace about your life. Let’s walk step by step with Jesus this Lent.

by Karen Twinem

Affirmations to Change Your Mind

We are asked to keep our thoughts pure, but our minds are often racing in the other direction. Affirmations are a mindful Christian approach to reining in your thoughts when you notice negativity, unrighteous anger and other bad attitudes.

Use them as a script to turn around your thinking, repeating as needed. Here’s a few affirmations to use:

  • Let compassion lead me.
  • Holy Spirit, speak through me.
  • I choose to renew my mind.
  • Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.

Deliberating breaking into your thinking pattern will help.

by Karen Twinem

The Kind of Lent God Wants

Giving up things – from Facebook to coffee – is a classic part of participating in Lent. This year, great suggestions from Pope Francis are on social media:

  • Fast from hurting words and say kind words.
  • Fast from sadness and be filled with gratitude.
  • Fast from anger and be filled with patience.
  • Fast from pessimism and be filled with hope.
  • Fast from worries and trust in God.
  • Fast from complaints and contemplate simplicity.
  • Fast from pressures and be prayerful.
  • Fast from bitterness and fill your heart with joy.
  • Fast from selfishness and be compassionate to others.
  • Fast from grudges and be reconciled.
  • Fast from words and be silent so you can listen.

Even with these wonderful ideas, God calls for fasting that helps people:

Then the word of the Lord of hosts came to me: Say to all the people in the land and to the priests: When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and the seventh month these 70 years, was it really for me that you fasted? … Thus says the Lord of hosts: Judge with true justice, and show kindness and compassion toward each other. Do not oppress the widow or the orphan, the resident alien or the poor; do not plot evil against one another in your hearts.

Zechariah 7:4-5, 9-10

Similar requests for fasting are in Isaiah:

“Is this what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter – when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

Isaiah 58: 5b-7

I think the Lord is serious. Lent is a good time for us to contemplate what we can do to make that happen.

by Karen Twinem

What’s God Up To?

When God does or allows the unexpected, our reactions can range from puzzlement to tears to shock to rage. What’s a good way to move through the initial feelings back into trust?

After all, God is good. He loves us dearly and wants what is best for us, even if it’s not pleasant at the time. God continues to reveal Himself to us even when we are perplexed.

I know a person who responds to any surprise with the same question: I wonder what God is up to? I think that’s a great way to move ourselves away from fear to trust. It sets us up to believe that God is in the situation and is working. We just need to wait to see what happens next.

by Karen Twinem

Resource: “The Art of Communicating”

Thich Nhat Hanh, the Vietnamese Buddhist monk who has done essential work in spreading the practice of mindfulness worldwide, has written dozens of books. “The Art of Communicating” is one of his best.

Although his work clearly comes from a Buddhist perspective, he has much to teach us all. One of my favorite chapters covers the four elements of right speech:

  1. Tell the truth. Don’t lie or turn the truth upside down.
  2. Don’t exaggerate.
  3. Be consistent. That means no double-talk: speaking about something in one way to one person and in another to someone else for selfish or manipulative reasons.
  4. Use peaceful language. Don’t use insulting or violent words, cruel speech, verbal abuse or condemnation.

The book is short, but so useful. I particularly like the Six Mantras of Loving Speech, which each person is free to adapt as the situation calls for it.

by Karen Twinem

Memo to Heart: Cheer Up!

A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

Proverbs 17:22

My word for Lent is hope. Cheerfulness is both a strategy and an end result for that.

How we react when trouble comes is the greatest witness to those around us. Maintaining a genuinely cheerful heart shows that we truly believe what we profess. Filling our minds with gratitude and praise for everything God has done for us – from dying on the Cross to creating trees – opens our hearts to feel the graces of joy and peace, no matter what else is happening.

One of my favorite quotes is from the late, great comedian Gilda Radner, written as she was dying from cancer:

“There will always be downslides and uncertainty. The goal is to live a full, productive life even with all this ambiguity. No matter what happens, I can control whether I am going to live a day in fear and depression and panic, or whether I am going to attack the day and make it as good a day, as wonderful a day, as I can.”

by Karen Twinem

Be Counter to the Culture This Lent

Many worry that the culture has moved further and further from the Christian faith, so that we may become irrelevant. I think it could be a blessing.

The American way of life often has been different from the Christian way of life, but we pretended otherwise. I lived in Mississippi for nearly 10 years and met people who hated African-Americans yet proudly went to church on Sunday. Materialism as a signpost for success is not exactly what the homeless man who died for us intended.

Today we have an opportunity to be noticeably different from the culture, and that’s good as long as we are different in a Christian way. Hate is never the Christian way.

It’s Ash Wednesday, and we’re starting the season of Lent. I’m blessed to have a church that has a moving and effective church service this day. For years, I didn’t so I created one at home. Here’s the ceremony should you need it:

  • Burn a list of your sins, a palm frond or an evergreen in a bowl to make ashes.
  • Open with this prayer: Let us ask our Heavenly Father to bless these ashes which we will use as a mark of our repentance. Lord, bless these ashes. Wearing them reminds us that we are from the dust of the Earth. Pardon our sins and keep us faithful to the resolutions that we have made for Lent. Help us to prepare well for the celebration of your Son’s glorious resurrection. Through Christ our Lord, Amen.
  • Mark your loved one’s foreheads, saying “Turn away from sin, and be faithful to the gospel.”
  • Close with this prayer: Loving Father, today we start Lent. From today, we make a new start to be more loving and kind. Help us to show more concern for the less fortunate, the hungry and the poor. Help us to love you more and speak to you more often. Through Christ our Lord, Amen.

by Karen Twinem

My Word for Lent: Hope

Happy Mardi Gras! We celebrate the day with pancakes in the morning and good vegetarian jambalaya for dinner. Today I also celebrated by picking out my word for Lent: hope.

Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him for the help of His presence.

Psalm 42:5 NASB

This Lent I am continuing to focus on practicing the presence of God. It’s been quite a rough year so far. So I feel God calling me to seek hope. George Mueller wrote: Even when our situation appears to be impossible, our work is to “hope in God.”

We know that we can never hope in vain, so that’s the focus of Lent for me. I pray you find your word also.

by Karen Twinem

Develop Your Lenten Resolutions

Ash Wednesday is a little more than three weeks away so it’s a good time for us to start thinking about our Lenten resolutions. I’ve used Lent to give up bad habits, but more often I take this time to create positive habits.

Think about how we can improve our prayer life, fasting and giving. Some families pick a charity and put their change into a bowl each day. Others give up eating out and give away the money they saved. My church took a recent pledge to not have cell phones at the dinner table. We can find many things to improve if we think and pray about it.

I also always have a Lenten reading program. In the past, I read a biography of a Christian I admired, a devotional and a general book about faith each Lent. Today it’s a lot more random. I just look at the bookshelves to see what I think would be helpful and inspiring.