How a Pentecostal Church Observed Lent
Darrell Huffman

About New Life Church
About Pastor Darrell Huffman

Easter represents a time of new beginnings. Easter is really the biblical feast of First Fruits. It was on this day Jesus was raised from the dead and become the first fruits of God.

1 Corinthians 15:20-23 says, “But now is Christ risen from the dead, and became the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.” 

Christ is the first fruits and then we find our life and victory over sin and death through Him.

The apostle Paul also talks about the importance of Christ’s resurrection in verses 17-19. He basically is telling us the resurrection of Christ is the foundation for our faith and for Christianity as a whole. Without the resurrection of Jesus Christ, our faith is futile; we are without hope and of all men most pitiable and miserable. Seeing the importance of this Holy Season, we should approach Easter and the event of Christ’s resurrection with holy awe and respect.

To help the congregation of New Life Church maximize the revelation and experience of Easter and the resurrection of Christ, I instituted something in our church that religion has stolen and perverted. This year, we rediscovered Lent with a Pentecostal, charismatic renewal experience in the Word and Spirit of God.

The Lenten celebration is a wonderful spiritual preparation for Easter. The sad thing is that through the excessive carnality we see through Mardi Gras and religion it has degenerated into a carnal form of religion with no power or spiritual purpose at all. I felt in my spirit that we could recapture the true spiritual essence of the Lenten season by bringing it back in line with a biblical purpose of preparing the Church for our greatest celebration of all, the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Lenten season begins on Ash Wednesday and goes through the Saturday before Easter. It is to be forty days of fasting, prayer, purging, and renewal of our hearts toward God. The forty days are fulfilled over the six weeks from Ash Wednesday to Easter. Sundays are considered days of rest so the fasting is from Monday through Saturday. With the six weeks excluding Sundays and adding the four days of Ash Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, you have your forty days.

I presented to our congregation the challenge of recovering the spiritual purpose of Lent by fasting a certain food during this season, setting aside a daily time of prayer and worship, and reading through the four Gospels. I chose the four Gospels to reintroduce the people to the life, teachings, and miracles of the Lord Jesus. I wanted to refocus the believers on the Lord Jesus Christ and not just the teachings about Him. The epistles are our foundation teachings for our faith, but Jesus Himself is the cornerstone of our life.

To help the people to refocus on having a spiritual renewal I taught on the importance of prayer, consecration, and renewing our spirit with time in God’s presence. We gave them a reading guide to follow to help them in their daily devotions. Throughout the Lenten season, I encouraged everybody to continue with their commitment. Then on Easter, I tied it all together with a great resurrection celebration service.

As I look back at our Easter season that started on Ash Wednesday, I am excited about the fruit that was brought forth. I received many testimonies of how the Gospels came alive to the people. Some talked about the teachings of Jesus, some about His love and others about how real His healing and miracles became. The people were refreshed and encouraged and Easter became more of a Holy Celebration and a time of renewal for us all.

I am already making plans to celebrate the Lenten season next year. We will add a few more things such as occasional testimonies in our services about what is happening in people’s lives as they renew themselves through prayer, fasting, and the Word. Our Easter service was much larger in attendance this year and we had many first time salvations. Next year I will put more emphasis on the people sharing their faith with outsiders and have a better plan on evangelism leading up to Easter.

There are many great truths that religion has tried to steal from the charismatic Church family. Lent was started by the early Church leaders as a way to mirror Christ’s fasting in the desert before He began His public ministry. This year we made Lent our time to rededicate ourselves to Christ and to continue His ministry to a lost and dying world.