2/10

day 2 of cwc's 10 day congregational fast.

it's been exciting to hear what people are fasting. everything from the internet to different foods or drinks.

i was talking to the junction kidz (kindergarten-4th grade) last week at church about fasting & their prayer requests. they totally get it. most of them were more than willing to give up something for 10 days.

i even had a hard time not telling them to give up too many things to make it hard on themselves. some of them listed 4-5 things! important things like the wii, tv, their favorite book, dvd players, barbies & cd players.

they are great examples of faith even as children.

i loved to hear their prayer requests too. these kids love to pray out loud. each week we make our list of prayer requests & praises. we always fill an entire sheet of poster-board sized paper. then they practically argue about who gets to pray out loud!

so, we divide up the list & give each person that wants to pray out loud a few. if they can't read we help them when it's their turn. or we just let them pray for whatever they want to.

it's awesome to hear their simple & sincere prayers. they know they can talk to God about anything from their teachers to helping them sit in class to healing the sick.

we, as adults, can learn so much from them. they are serious about fasting & prayer.

for the 24 hour day of prayer next weekend the kids will meet from 10-11 am on saturday to pray. then we're going to finish off with pizza & root beer floats.

it's good for us to keep each other accountable for the next 10 days (& beyond...). as i was talking to the kidz last week about fasting i had written down pop & chocolate. we kept talking about how it's important to give up something important to you so that it really means something. i thought, wow, what really means anything to me? it really wouldn't be that hard to go without pop or chocolate for 10 days even though i like it.

so, what did God tell me to do?

fast from reading fiction.

whoa. did i hear that right? do i need to pray about that some more?

nope.

i love to read. fiction. a good story. purely for fun.

so...for the next 9 days i will not read any of my regular fiction books.

yesterday we went to north platte. do you know that one of my favorite places to read is in the car on a trip? brad was glad since i actually talked to him instead of reading silently in the passenger seat.

it's good for me. i know that. i'm only reading my bible.

so in the car i was reading the life journal selection from yesterday, judges 1-3. i read aloud to brad about ehud killing the eglon kind of moab who was a "very fat man."

you'd better go get your bibles & read about it for yourself. interesting reading, i tell you.