What is Lent (and Shrove Tuesday)?
Today is Feb 24, Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Tuesday.
Rio Carnival
Shrove Tuesday is the last day of “shrovetide”, the English equivalent to the carnival tradition that developed separately in countries of Latin Europe.
As a result the New Orleans and Rio Carnivals are on at the moment.
I think it’s fair to say that if the Brazil Govt is giving out 65 million condoms during the festival, that the carnival has lost connection with it’s original meaning. 
Pancakes Shrove Tuesday
Because Shrove Tuesday is the day before Lent begins, it’s the day on which observers tend to eat the rich foods that will go off during lent. One of the ways to eat that is to make pancakes, so in the UK Shrove tuesday is called Pancake Day or Pancake Tuesday.
Tomorrow is Feb 25, Ash Weds and it’s the start of Lent. Lent is the 40 days (excluding 6 sundays, so 46 days in total) prior to Easter. Lent ends on Easter, which is two days after Good Friday.
- Good Friday celebrates Jesus Christs death
- Easter Celebrates the resurrection of Jesus Christ
Will you observe Lent with me this year please?
With so much of the world suffering increasing mayhem, will you join me in a time of fasting and prayer? This world needs to receive the second life that was given to Barabbas, as I previously wrote.
Do not pray asking Him to do what He has already done on the cross – taken our sins and paid the full penalty – instead have faith in that this complete works IS done. Have faith because we receive it by faith. Knowing is not receiving, we need to receive!
This morning I received some scripture pointing again to the fact that our captivity (to sin and death) IS reversed and our fortunes (blessing and favor) ARE restored. The scriptures also encouraged me to keep speaking out the truth that Babylon HAS fallen.
God is not a man, that he should lie,
nor a son of man, that he should change his mind.
Does he speak and then not act?
Does he promise and not fulfill? – Num 23:19
Apart from love and justice, one of the things He wants to see on the earth is faith
I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” – Luke 18:8
As Hebrews explains, we cannot enter into the inner part of the temple while the outer part remains standing.
By this the Holy Spirit points out that the way into the [true Holy of] Holies is not yet thrown open as long as the former [the outer portion of the] tabernacle remains a recognized institution and is still standing – Heb 9:8
So… when you go boldly before the throne during this Lent, do not go before God because you believe that tithing and it opens the old testament windows to you, neither because you love people, nor because you’ve tried to do good, nor because you are under some church covering , nor alignment with some apostle character, nor because you are in unity with brethren – or any other teaching of your works making you acceptable.
No! Abandon the outer tabernacle of good works and lean your entire personality on Him and His work on the cross (Good Friday) and in His resurrection (Easter). Only One thing makes this world acceptable to God, only One thing turns His face to us, only One thing undoes the fall, only One thing cleanses Heaven and Earth.
This Lent, leading up to Good Friday and Easter, focus not on your good works, focus on the One Who made us acceptable to God, transferring us into the Kingdom of the Son of His love
[The Father] has delivered and drawn us to Himself out of the control and the dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love – Col 1:13
That “One” which I am writing about, which Lent is a preparation for, which Easter and Good friday are all about… that One is Jesus Christ.
Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. – Heb 4:16
This Lent, go boldly before the throne in prayer, because Jesus Christ died in the place of everyone, because He HAS brought peace between us and God, because He provided the full atonement for our sins. Because He brought in the new covenant promised through Jeremiah in which God promised “I will remember their sins and lawbreaking no more”.
Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was their Husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, says the Lord, I will put My law within them, and on their hearts will I write it; and I will be their God, and they will be My people. And they will no more teach each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they will all know Me [recognize, understand, and be acquainted with Me], from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will [seriously] remember their sin no more. – Jer 31:31-34
For I will be merciful and gracious toward their sins and I will remember their deeds of unrighteousness no more. – Heb 8:12
He then goes on to say, And their sins and their lawbreaking I will remember no more. – Heb 10:17
God is not a man that He should lie. We ARE in the new covenant!
So what is missing? FAITH!
Go boldly before the throne in prayer, in fasting and based on the finished work of Jesus Christ – and on that basis alone! Abandon the outer tabernacle as the requirement for entering into the inner part – according to the book of Hebrews. You can see in my video here that this was true of Barabbas and it’s true for this whole world.
And remember, we can HEAR the good news, but to RECEIVE it so that it makes a difference, we must “add” our faith.
For indeed we have had the glad tidings [Gospel of God] proclaimed to us just as truly as they [the Israelites of old did when the good news of deliverance from bondage came to them]; but the message they heard did not benefit them, because it was not mixed with faith (with the leaning of the entire personality on God in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness) by those who heard it – Heb 4:2
As a Christian, it is your unique priviledge to receive this truth on behalf of an unbelieving world. He died for all out sins, He died in the place of everyone… not just you and your church buddies. Receive it!
