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Praying about the flow of time: Preparing for a creative Lent

Lynne Baab • Tuesday February 25 2025

Lent begins next week on March 5. This year for Lent, I’m going to do something I haven’t done for about ten years. I normally wear gold earrings and colorful necklaces. For Lent, I’m going to wear only silver earrings, plus my silver cross necklace that I hardly ever wear. When I’ve done this in the past — maybe for six or eight Lents between 1990 and 2010 — the dullness of the silver (compared with gold) and the absence of color speaks to me of the sorrow of walking with Jesus to the cross. And of course the cross speaks...

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Fasting matters in 2019

Lynne Baab • Saturday October 19 2019

I am convinced that in 2019 and into the next decade we need to encourage creative ways of fasting, especially fasts from technology. Parents need to talk naturally to their kids about foregoing certain aspects of technology for finite periods of time. Parents need to model it, and children and teens need to be encouraged to try it.

I’ve been pondering what this might look like, and I was reminded of the interviews I did with Christians overseas for my book on fasting. Friends connected me with people they knew on just about every continent. All of my overseas interviewees talked about...

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Fasting from words

Lynne Baab • Friday October 11 2019

Last Friday morning was stressful. The stress originated Thursday afternoon, when for some unknown reason, I felt so tired I couldn’t make myself exercise as I normally do on Thursday afternoon. I took a long nap, something I almost never do, and I was so groggy the rest of the afternoon and evening that I couldn’t do anything productive.

By the time I got to my desk on Friday morning, I had an hour to get through a list of small tasks before I needed to get out on my bicycle, to make up for the lost exercise on Thursday. As I...

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Fasting and our bodies

Lynne Baab • Thursday October 3 2019

My body and I have a checkered relationship. As a teenager I was quite athletic and physically active. As an adult, I have exercised three times a week, almost every week, for decades. Exercise calms my rioting thoughts and emotions, helps me sleep better, and gets me out in nature. Throughout my adult life and even now, in my 60s, I haven’t been super athletic, but neither am I completely sedentary. I’d love to exercise a bit more, but what I do works well for me.

My eating, however, is another story. In my teen years, my mother and I engaged in...

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Friendship, Listening, and Empathy: A Prayer Guide Lynne draws on her Ph.D. studies in communication to bring insight about listening and empathy so that we can pray more deeply. Each of the 28 short chapters is illustrated with a beautiful watercolor by Dave Baab. Buy online »

Draw Near: A Lenten Devotional Lynne has chosen one psalm for each day of Lent and offers brief reflection/discussion questions that can be used alone or in a group. Illustrated with more than 50 of Dave Baab's beautiful watercolors. Buy online »

Lynne Baab