The Lenten Journey to Easter’s Joy   Since the earliest origins of what we know today as the Christian Church, there’s evidence of a Lenten preparation in the 40 days, not counting Sundays, which begins on Ash Wednesday, this year on March 5th. In our Western Christian culture, Lent’ is a moving Christian Holiday period that precedes and prepares us for Easter Sunday, April 20th, 2025. Today, many Christians still observe the 40 days preceding Easter as a time of preparation, fasting, a time of baptism for all converts and penitence. Besides preparation, fasting and repentance, many Christians’ make vows to ‘give up’ many types of personal things, including certain habits each day during Lent.  There are many things involved in personal penitence to mention that many may give up or sacrifice for Lent today…including foods, alcohol, hard to break habits, and many more personal habits, to name just a few.  But to many Believers, true choices also include repentance from personal sins, forming new and productive personal habits such as reading and studying the events leading up to and including the death of Jesus on the Cross for our salvation. The are many Believers today that may attend church also every Sunday, volunteer to help others, pray every day, live simply, and supporting others financially as changes in their lives. The tradition of change in personal habits and times of the season and date of Lent and Easter Sunday,  throughout history have been observed with many changes. These events include not only prayer, fasting, and penance that we know today, but also events of  ‘Palm Sunday’, describing Jesus Christ entering through the East Gate of Jerusalem, and the crowds of people during Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday or Holy Thursday, which represents the meeting of Christ’s disciples in the upper room for the Last Supper, His washing the feet of the Apostles present, then and teaching them to ‘Love others as He first loved them’.  We remember His later arrest in the Gardens of Gethsemane and the mockery of His trial, the Passion of Christ that followed, and His Crucifixion, His death and of His glorious Resurrection on Easter Sunday! During this season of Lent, leading up to the joys and celebrations of Easter Sunday, we are reminded and  should be reminded constantly, of the values in ourselves, the relationships surrounding ourselves and our families.  We, as Believers, are taught throughout our lives to "Love One Another as He First Loved Us”! There are many of us that are caught up in the traditions and history of these impending Holy Days, but also by questions and actions, about ourselves during the other 11 months of the year? We may ask ourselves ‘how do we share the love He taught us’, not only when we read the scriptures in our Bibles, but of all time, and hopefully with those close to us and share them with those we have yet to meet? These are the times we are all are invited to discover, and for many, rediscover "the true meaning of love” through the glory of the celebration of the Risen Christ!  The discovery or the wonder of rediscovery, of remembrance that Christ died for us and paid our sin debts forever, that we may truly live, makes a whole new world open for us! We have the super opportunity to reconnect or for some, connect for the first time, and realize His love for us. We then can truly learn to love those closest to us, our spouses, family, neighbors, friends, those we have yet to meet ….and especially ‘ourselves’, as He commanded then and still does today!  Some folks really believe that Valentines Day is the real reason for love. But there is no greater love demonstrated, than in our spiritual walk, than that of our Lord and Savior giving His life for us on the hills of Golgotha, to save you and me and pay our sin debt! The very least we can do to honor Christ and His phenomenal gift to us is to live by and teach others to love through our actions……by "Loving Others as He First Loved Us”! It is by His Grace we are saved…..by His Word we are to live….and by His Will, we serve others….