Ordinary Life

For a really long time, my blog was titled a really random name from the old school cartoon on Nickalodeon, Doug. Now Joey is no more.

I've been thinking about changing the name for a while and the season of Lent got me thinking about it again. What stirred the decision was considering how the "Christian year" is divided into the seasons of Lent, Easter, Ordinary days, Advent, and Christmas. The church I use to go to got me reflecting about the ordinary days. They appear to be the most understated times of the year but just as critical as the rest. As a result, I've decided to revamp this old blog.

Since I returned to school this past fall, lots of thoughts have been flying through my head and that's kind of where they've stayed. The unfortunate piece about that is that there have been many things I've been processing and some of the other blogs I follow have planted a seed in me to write.

As this new season of blogging falls into Lent, I've decided to talk about it. This past week, I went through a lesson on Lent with my high school discipleship group. I found this terrific idea from RETHINK as I was preparing for the group. As a part of the lesson we created masks. It comes from the idea that masks often hide something. Essentially, we're all hiding behind something that we're ashamed of, dislike about yourselves, afraid that others will see, or what have you. The season of Lent is a time to shed those masks and live as who God created us to be and to understand His forgiveness and His love for us. The activity asked us to put words, images, colors on the outside of the mask that represents how other people see us/how we want others to see us. Then on the inside of the masks we paste words, images etc. that represent our doubts, fears, insecurities and the like. I encourage you to try it sometime. I think it can be a pretty powerful time of self-reflection and awareness.

A passage from the Bible that captures the idea of Lent for me is Galatians 5:19-26

¹⁹The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; ²⁰idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions ²¹and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

²²But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ²³gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. ²⁴Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. ²⁵Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. ²⁶Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.

What I find true in my life is that the majority of the time the "masks" in my life are there to hide "the acts of the sinful nature" or the calling of my flesh and humanity. Lent is this time of freedom where the covering is sometimes painfully peeled away so that we can live as we're intended to live through the fruit of the Spirit.

Lent isn't just about giving stuff up. It's about untying the things in our lives that allows the Deceptive one a foothold in our lives. It's saying that we will not be mastered by our bodies and that we are capable of choosing to live and be people who are full of "love, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." The truth of the matter is, shedding the masks requires all of those characteristics of the fruit.