from 2/18/2018 (4 kids; 1 is male; 2 is female; 3 & 4 can be either gender)
1: Hey! Wait up you guys!! My sister forgot she was doing a fundraiser, so my Mom wound up having to buy a whole box of chocolate from her. Want some?
2: No thanks. I gave up chocolate for Lent.
1: Uh, I’m giving it to you, not lending it to you. I really don’t want it back after you eat it.
3: She doesn’t want to borrow it. She isn’t eating any chocolate because of her religion. I will gladly eat her share though. Thanks!
1: What does chocolate have to do with religion?
3: She’s a Christian, they’re only allowed to eat chocolate bunnies. All other chocolate is a sin.
4: Stop messing with him! Lent – L-E-N-T – is a season before Easter when people think about what Jesus did for us by dying on the cross.
2: This year, every time I want to eat chocolate, I think about Jesus instead. That’s what I meant by giving up chocolate for Lent.
3: I always want to eat chocolate. I’d be thinking about Jesus nonstop.
4: That wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Maybe you should try it.
1: I still don’t understand this Lent thing. What exactly is it?
2: Ok, you know how the year has different seasons and you do different things during them.
1: Like sledding in the winter and waterskiing in the summer.
2: Yeah, like that. Well, the church has different seasons throughout the year too. It starts with Advent, when we are getting ready for Jesus’s birthday, then Christmas, then Epiphany, then Lent.
3: So Lent is every February?
4: No, sometimes it starts in February, sometimes in March. It is always 40 days before Easter.
3: Christmas is on December 25th every year, what day is Easter? Shouldn’t Lent always start at the same time if it starts 40 days before Easter?
2: (mumbling) I should have just taken the chocolate. This is getting more complicated by the minute. (louder) Easter is on a different calendar day each year.
3: Well, that’s dumb. Don’t people get confused?
4: Sometimes. It started a long time ago, before the calendar we use now was invented. People told time, days, months, and stuff from the sun and the moon. Easter is still based on an old calendar that followed the phases of the moon.
2: Easter Sunday is always the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox.
1: I have no idea what any of that means.
4: Well, you know how the daytime is longer in June than December.
3: Yeah, we learned about that in science class. The earth is going around the sun and tilted closest to it in June.
1: And furthest away from the sun in December – at least in the north.
2: Right. In between those two, in Spring and Fall, there are the equinoxes. The day and night are the same length. They’re equal! After the ‘equal day’ in the Spring, we wait for the next full moon. The following Sunday is Easter!
1: So every year, Christians figure out what day the day and night will be equal. Then they figure out when the next full moon is…
2: And Easter starts the Sunday after that!
3: That’s way more work than I want to do to figure out a holiday.
4: A lot of Christians agree. Different people have been trying to change it for centuries. My recommendation – just google ‘Easter’ along with whatever year it is. This year is April 1st. Lent began last Wednesday.
1: Hey, wasn’t that the day you forgot to wash your faces? You both had dirt on your foreheads!
2: That wasn’t dirt. It was ashes.
1: According to my grandma, ashes count as dirt. She was furious that time I got dirt all over her living room when I had my GI Joes invade the enemy in her fireplace.
2: Well, this wasn’t ashes from her fireplace. There is a special service the day Lent begins called Ash Wednesday. We are anointed with the ashes from last year’s palms from Palm Sunday. It reminds us how human we are.
4: It is also a sign of repentance. We confess our sins to God, tell Him we are sorry. He forgives us and we vow to try better.
1: All that with ashes?
2: It’s a reminder to us. In the olden days, people would cover themselves in ashes to show how sad they were. We are sad when we don’t live up to what God wants for us.
3: Hold up a minute! I just checked my calendar. There are more than 40 days between February 14th and April 1st. Can’t Christians count? Or do you have different calendars and weird math?
4: Subtract the Sundays.
3: What?! This is a new math. OK, 1,2,3,…Fine – it is 40 without the Sundays. I thought Sundays were important to Christians. Why would you skip the Sundays?!
2: Lent is 40 days of fasting and repentance. Those 40 days are a time to be somber and think about Jesus’s sacrifice for us. Sundays are always a celebration of His resurrection. Therefore, Sundays don’t count toward the 40 days.
1: (sarcastically) Obviously. Why 40 days? That’s not even an even number of weeks. It’s like a month plus a week and a few days!
2: Forty is a common number in the Bible. People thought it signified something special.
4: Like God sending rain to flood the earth for 40 days & nights. The Israelites spent 40 years wandering in the wilderness after they fled Egypt. Elijah fasted for 40 days on Mt Horeb before God spoke to him. Nineveh fasted for 40 days to repent before God forgave them. Jesus fasted in the wilderness for 40 days and Jesus spent 40 days on earth after He was resurrected.
2: No one today knows exactly why the number 40, but it has come to signify cleansing and transformation. That’s also what Lent is about. We set this time aside to remember how God is changing us over into the image of Jesus.
3: So… this Lent thing is 40 days not counting Sundays, starts on a different date every year, they rub dirt on your face, you get a make-over to look like a first-century Jewish man, and they take away your chocolate?! Why would anyone want to be a Christian?
2: Being a Christian is more than just those things. Lent isn’t about just those things. And not everyone gives up chocolate for Lent. That is what I chose to do this year.
4: Being a Christian means following Jesus all year. Lent is the time we set aside to think especially about his death and what it means to each of us and to the world. He changed us by dying for us – changed our hearts, not our faces.
1: I still don’t get it. How can someone’s death change your heart?
2: Love always changes the heart. Love changes how we look at the world. Think about how people act when they are filled with bitterness and hate.
1: I try to stay away from people like that. They’re almost always mean and nasty to everybody else. It puts me in a bad mood.
2: Exactly. And are you ever mean and nasty to others because someone was mean and nasty to you?
3: Yes he is!
2: Do you treat people better after being with someone who was treating you well – maybe even showed you that they cared about you?
1: Yeah, I guess I am. It’s easier to care about other people when I know someone cares about me.
4: We learn to love by being loved. And Jesus loves us more than humanly possible – he loves us even more than our parents. He was willing to die for us even though we don’t deserve his love.
3: Why would he love us so much?
2: Because God does. He made us to love and to be loved. When sin came into the world, humans had a hard time with love. They had trouble trusting God loved them. Sin, and all our sins, stem back to distrusting God and His love. We want to trust ourselves more than we trust God.
4: By dying for us, Jesus forgave us all our sins. He was perfect and not sinful. He trusted God completely because He was one with God. God sees Jesus’ complete trust and obedience instead of our sin.
2: Jesus shows us how to love by loving us. He sends the Holy Spirit to help us trust and believe. He forgives us when we sin. Lent is about focusing on those things. The disciplines people do, like me giving up chocolate, are ways people try to train themselves to focus.
3: Like the speed drills coach has us do for hockey?
4: Exactly. To get better at something, people practice. People practice for sports, music, art, hobbies – lots of things. During Lent, Christians look for ways to practice remembering God’s love for them. We practice thinking about how much God loved us and has done for us.
2: We do this all year, but during Lent, it’s a little like when coach makes you do suicide drills for the whole practice. We practice more intensely on one facet of discipleship.
1: So giving up chocolate is an activity to help you practice thinking about Jesus?

2: For me it is, but giving up chocolate wouldn’t work for someone who doesn’t like chocolate. They might give up coffee, or pop, or another favorite food. Someone else might practice by doing a special Bible reading plan, or prayer service. Some pray while walking or running a certain distance each day.
4: Some people clean out their old clothes and give them away. Others pick a special charity and put aside a certain amount of money each day. Some people pray for people who are sick while making a shawl for them.
2: There are lots of activities people use to practice focusing on Jesus. Everyone has different strengths and weaknesses. We try to find what helps each of us focus on Jesus the best.
3: Just like the same drill doesn’t help each player the same way. I can skate really fast, but I can be pretty clumsy with the puck. Coach has me do extra agility drills. My teammate has great stick coordination, but needs to get faster. Coach has her do speed drills.
2: You’re starting to get it. The goal is to know Jesus and how much He loves us. We love Jesus and want to serve Him. Lent is a time to practice doing that intensely. We practice being His disciples – each of us to the best of our ability with His help.
1: Will you help me find a way to practice being a disciple?
3: Me too?
2 & 4: Certainly!
4: Let us pray. Lord, you have called each of us to be your disciples in this world. Thank you for making us your children and for loving us. Help us to focus on knowing you and your Will for us. Help each of us grow closer to you and strengthen our faith during these forty days of Lent. In Jesus’ name we pray.
1,2,3,4: Amen!