Lent is considered as a season of penance and prayer before Easter, also associated with withdrawing from certain indulgences. Lent of 2016 starts 6 weeks leading up to Easter Sunday, means Lent starts on different date every year.
When Lent Start in 2016?
Lent takes place from February 10 till March 26, 2016, lasting for a period of approximately six weeks leading up to Easter Sunday. In the general Latin-rite and most Western denominations Lent is taken to run from Ash Wednesday to Maundy Thursday (Holy Thursday) morning or to Easter Eve.
The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer through prayer, penance, repentance, alms-giving, and self-denial. Its institutional purpose is heightened in the annual commemoration of Holy Week, marking the death and resurrection of Jesus, which recalls the events of the Bible when Jesus is crucified on Good Friday, which then culminates in the celebration on Easter Sunday of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
During Lent, many of the faithful commit to fasting or giving up certain types of luxuries as a form of penitence. The Stations of the Cross, a devotional commemoration of Christ's carrying the Cross and of his execution, are often observed. Many Roman Catholic and some Protestant churches remove flowers from their altars, while crucifixes, religious statues, and other elaborate religious symbols are often veiled in violet fabrics in solemn observance of the event.
Here are top five Bible verses to help you think about lent, including the meanding and what-to-do and why.
Rend Your Heart
12 “Even now,” declares the LORD, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.” 13 Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity. 14 Who knows? He may turn and relent and leave behind a blessing— grain offerings and drink offerings for the LORD your God. (Joel 2:12-14 NIV)
Seek God with fasting, sackcloth and ashes
And I set my face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes;(Daniel 9:3 KJV)
Remember that we are dust
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou [art], and unto dust shalt thou return. (Genesis 3:19 KJV)
Fasting
16 “When you fast, do not look somber as the hypocrites do, for they disfigure their faces to show others they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 17 But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18 so that it will not be obvious to others that you are fasting, but only to your Father, who is unseen; and your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. (Matthew 6:16-18 NIV)
Humble yourself
6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. (1 Peter 5:6 NIV)
Confession
21 “But if a wicked person turns away from all the sins they have committed and keeps all my decrees and does what is just and right, that person will surely live; they will not die.(Ezekiel 18:21 NIV
And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. (Acts 15:9)
Repent
And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel. (Mark 1:15)
I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.(Luke 13:3)
I, [even] I, [am] he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins. (Isaiah 43:25 KJV)
