Do me a favor. Don’t turn on the television news next Tuesday. Because I just know all the networks will be giving special attention to the Mardi Gras. That’s the festival that’s being held in New Orleans next week. I won’t even go into details about what goes on… or what a Mardi Gras parade looks like. Believe me, I’d rather forget about it!
And it is a shame, ’cause even the name “Mardi Gras,” which means “Fat Tuesday” in French is a mockery of the original Christian celebration. You see, on the Tuesday before Lent, I remember our church – a small evangelical Episcopal church in Baltimore – our congregation on Tuesday evening always had a church supper. It was called Shrove Tuesday. That evening would mark the time right before fasting and repentance which would start the next day. It was a serious time of examining your soul, asking the Spirit of Christ to show you those areas of your life – maybe wrongful habits or sins, or the need to reconcile with people you’ve hurt or offended – it was a period of 40 days, all of it to prepare your heart to celebrate Easter (after all, how can you be joyful about Jesus dying on the cross for your sins if first you don’t seriously consider what those sins are and how they offend God, right? And how you need to repent and turn away from them).
Well, anyway, back to the Tuesday evening church supper. Pancakes were usually served. Lots and lots of pancakes. That’s because way back in the Middle Ages, those Christians who knew they were about to enter a time of repentance and fasting? Well… the night before they started their fast, they would use up whatever supplies of fat, butter, flour, or eggs that might be in the house. That Tuesday evening church supper was always so much fun – who wouldn’t love a supper of pancakes, butter, and syrup, right? You’d often hear that verse from Ecclesiastes 2 where it says, “A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or who can find enjoyment?”
Alas, you better believe the devil has turned that celebration upside down, right? You know that of course he would! After all, Satan doesn’t want anyone fasting to the Lord, or praying or repenting from sin. And so, the world began to mock Shrove Tuesday, calling it Fat Tuesday, or Mardi Gras as it means in French. And the whole Mardi Gras thing has become a stench to the Lord and to His people.
But I'm going to pray for all those lost, lost souls who are partying on all those weird floats in that awful parade. Because no one – I mean no one – can find satisfaction in eating and drinking unless they bow to the hand of God just like it says in Ecclesiastes 2.
Used by permission of
JONI AND FRIENDS
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