How to Make the Most of Daily Lent Readings
First, you will notice that Lent lasts for 40 days, but we only have ten days of daily practice. For this practice, we will take the Rolheiser’s ten commandments and spend about 15-20 minutes minimum each day with that commandment. We will go through all ten and then return to the first one when we are done. 40 days of Lent and only 10 commandments allow us to go through each commandment 4 times. This will make room for two things:
A repetition that brings formation.
The opportunity to drill down deep into ten important things for walking in maturity as a believer in Christ.
I have found it helpful to have concise information when practicing spiritual formation. I get overwhelmed when there is too much information or resource given.
The second thing you will notice is that a short section of scripture has been added along with the commandment to tie the two together. It will be a short section of scripture for two reasons.
You may choose to memorize the scripture (not mandatory).
However, my hope is that when Lent is over – you will remember these scriptures and be able to pray them over your life as various life situations occur. Praying the scripture is an important part of Christian maturity.
Last thing you will notice is that there is an action step at the end of each day. These action steps will not require a large amount of work (most of them can be done in the time allotted during your daily office) but will be important in developing your spiritual formation.
For example, for the first commandment on being grateful, you will be asked to send a text to three people you are grateful for and then write in your journal two things that you would like to show more gratitude towards. While this may seem simple, and it is, think about it this way – over the course of 40 days you will compile a list of 20 people/things/places that you have gratitude towards.
My hope is that you will start to see your spiritual formation not as large chunks of perfection at once, but more as small individual steps in the same direction, or as Eugene Peterson wrote, “A long obedience in the same direction.”