“For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you.” 2 Corinthians 1:12

I like simple.

Simple pleasures, simple foods, simple days. A flower in an unexpected place.  A hearty bowl of stew on a cold wintry day, meandering down a country road or an evening with the family gathered in the living room sharing laughs and love … all of these things bring a smile to my face and peace to my soul.

Ironically simplicity requires difficult choices, an iron will, and nerves of steel. The world, your work, and even your own heart will try to sneak in and wreak havoc with a simple life.

Jesus led a simple life.  He had one goal: to do His Father’s will. How simple is that? Without a smart phone or iPad (my two mainstays), He managed to turn the world upside down. In order to live a simple life, we must simplify our priorities.

Simple Life Focus:

One command: Love the Lord with all your heart

One commission: Tell the world

One goal: Bring Him Glory

Empty your heart. Fill up with God.

It’s simple.

To learn more about the simple life, simply scroll through the Sway. Have a blessed Lent.

Here is our TalkShoe chat on Simplicity:

Have a simply blessed Lent.

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 As a child, the season of Lent often began with a battle royal for me.

You see, my parents always encouraged my sisters and me to give up something for Lent. More often than not, I usually gave up candy. Every week a good portion of my weekly allowance quickly found it’s way from my pocket to the coffers of Krajci’s Drugstore a few blocks from my house. In the small town where I lived, Krajci’s was one of the few places that had a huge selection of five- and ten-cent candy. Bub’s Daddy Bubble Gum, Paydays, Wonka Bottle Caps, Snickers Bars, and cherry Colas were a few of the items I splurged on. Forty days seemed an awfully long time to go without a treat from Krajci’s.

Self-denial

I didn’t totally understand at the time the purpose for giving up something during Lent. I would have been happy to have given up brussel sprouts or tuna noodle casserole, but I understood enough to realize that what I gave up needed to be something that I actually liked.

Today I realize that one of the purposes of self-denial is that it is part of the process of spiritual formation. I need to cooperate with the Holy Spirit so that He continues to transform my life to make me more like Christ.

In that spirit, this year during Lent I am going to work on “giving up” a sin pattern in my life — and hopefully this will be something that continues for the rest of the year too. I think I know just what bad habit I want to be rid of this year: lateness.

Tardiness has been a habit that has plagued me since childhood. It worsened during my teen years (just ask my best friend Pam who drove me to school most mornings). I was always rushing around stressing myself out and anyone else that had the misfortune of being around me. I’ve since made some changes but still have plenty of room for more. I know this won’t be an easy fix for me, but I’m expecting progress!

If you’d like to join me in giving something up for Lent, tell me about it in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from a few fellow bad-habit breakers.

Pray on!

Welcome to Lent Day 10, Care for Your Body. Today we will look at self-denial and how that relates to caring for your body. As much as we can, we should strive to take care of our physical bodies as well as our spiritual selves. Chronic illness can make that very difficult. Sometimes we have to accept what we can’t change and work on what we can. Click below to read today’s devotion.

Lent Day 10, Caring for Your Body

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Welcome to Lent Day 9, Words. Today we are going to take a look at what words have to do with self-denial. How important is what comes out of our mouths? We’ll look at this through the eyes of Proverbs 25:11. Thanks for joining us and just click on the link below to open up today’s devotion!

Lent Day 9, Words

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Welcome to Day 7 Devotional. Today we tackle the topic of greed in our week of studying self-denial. I knew this week was going to be a challenging one with this topic, and I was right! Thanks for joining us and click on the link below to read today’s post.

Lent Day 7, Greed

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Welcome to Lent, Day 6. Today we talk about surrender and how important that is in our study of self-denial. Just click on the link below to read today’s devotional.

Lent Day 6 Surrender

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