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  How Is Lent Relevant Today? Part 2: The Physical Benefits of Fasting   Biblical References to Fasting Lent, traditionally, is a time for Christians to fast and pray. In this post we will discover that there are many physical benefits to giving up foods and drinks that we would normally enjoy. We will look more deeply into the spirituality of fasting in a future post. It will, however, enlighten us to firstly establish the Biblical origins of fasting. We can go right back to Moses receiving the Ten Commandments to witness fasting in earnest: “Moses was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights without eating bread or drinking water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant” Exodus 34:28 (NIV UK). When Saul took his own life following defeat by the Philistine army, the Israelites fasted for seven days to mourn Saul’s death; see 1 Samuel 31:13 . Ezra called a fast in order to ask for God’s help as he led the Israelites back to Jerusalem from ...

  How Is Lent Relevant Today?   Part 1: An Overview of the Christian Festival of Lent   The History of Lent LENT WAS FIRST MENTIONED in 325 A.D. by the Council of Nicaea, which issued twenty canons: detailed instructions relating to church life. The fifth of these canons dealt with Lent, a period of forty days of preparation leading up to Easter Sunday. Previously, Christians had spent just a few days preparing for the celebration of Christ’s resurrection. The Council of Nicaea chose a forty-day period based on Jesus’ time of fasting in the wilderness: “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.   After fasting for forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.” Matthew 4: 1-2 (NIVUK) The word for Lent in many languages, including Italian, Spanish and French, translates to ‘forty’, derived from the biblical period of fasting as mentioned in the above passage of scripture. The English word for Lent, however, has ...