Since it is Holy Week, I am inviting everyone to fast from all extraneous food and activity.

I am not saying fast for the week but consider eating half of what you would normally until Easter Vigil/Easter morning.

Do what you have to do but pare down extra entertainment and unnecessary shopping, limit media use (including phone use), and use the time for extra Bible reading and/or prayer.

Also, go to church on Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, (Holy Saturday and the Easter Vigil) as well as Easter Day itself. If your faith community doesn’t offer services on those days, find one that does.

It is interesting to me that Europe, not considered a bastion of Christianity any more, still shuts down for Good Friday (sometimes closing early on Maundy Thursday) and STAYS CLOSED DOWN through Easter Sunday. (In some countries, Easter Monday is a holiday, too.)

How many people in this country aren’t exactly sure when Easter even is? As a witness to these people and to the children in your circle of influence, make Holy Week a different kind of week. Walk fully with Jesus from Palm Sunday through the Last Supper, and Crucifixion. Sit on Holy Saturday with the distraught disciples, who nevertheless still kept the Law and stayed home rather than running back to the tomb to “finish up–God will understand.” (Think what they might have missed if they had gone back on Saturday, in violation of the Discipline of the Sabbath, and then not needed to go on Sunday!) Rise with anticipation for the Easter Vigil/Easter morning services a new creation in Christ yourself.

Fast from North American culture this week and Feast on the culture of the Kingdom of Heaven.