Taking up for Lent

Many have asked me, “What are you giving up for Lent?” My answer? Nothing. This year, I took something up instead.

I took all the cards I had received last Christmas and selected 40 at random. I assigned a date to each one of the 40 senders, put them on my calendar so there was one on each day between Ash Wednesday and Easter Sunday. Then when their date came up, I prayed for them and their family. I also emailed or wrote a letter to each family and let them know of my plan and the date I would be praying for them. I asked them to mark the date on their calendar as well.

I received so many wonderful and touching thank-you notes during Lent and for a long time after. One friend even hugged me, tears welling up in her eyes. She told me the day I prayed for her was exactly four years to the date that her father had passed away. She was so thankful for prayers that day.

What have you taken up this Lent?

This message was adapted from “IdeaNet: Good Friday’s Cross to Easter Joy” by Mary Jean Baker that appeared in the April 2002 issue of Lutheran Woman Today (now Gather) magazine. Today is the third Sunday in Lent. We remember Perpetua and Felicity and companions, martyrs at Carthage, who died in 202.

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