TODAY MARKS THE third Sunday of Lent, which means I’m in my third week of my Lenten discipline. Every year, I have to decide anew what that discipline will be. Many people take on some kind of a fast, whether that means literally abstaining from food or giving up something else, including activities that may take too much of our time and attention. What habits might we need to break? One person might choose to fast off of chocolate for 40 days; another might do well to swear off social media.

Me? Personally, fasting off of some kind of food is a less relevant sacrifice, because I’m already pretty disciplined in my eating habits (my wife tells me that I eat more healthily than anyone she knows). Frankly, though, it’s taken a while for me to get there. I bought my first fitness tracker probably 10 years ago, and was horrified to see in hard numbers just how sedentary I had become. I knew that if I started some kind of radical fitness program, I probably wouldn’t stick with it (okay, show of hands: how many of you bought a gym membership that you let lapse after a few months?). So I started making small changes in habits: at work, instead of taking the elevator, I take the stairs; when I go shopping, I park further away from the door. Those changes have stuck over time.

But then came the COVID-19 pandemic and the warnings to stay at home. Suddenly, all of my work was done sitting in front of a computer. Except for the occasional masked-up shopping trip, my physical world shrank to the size of our house. My tracker wasn’t happy with me. It’s a good thing it couldn’t talk.

My body wasn’t happy with me either. When the sheltering restrictions eased, I went to see my doctor for a physical, and she ordered some routine blood tests. I didn’t think much of it, because my blood tests had always been normal. But not this time. Both my cholesterol and my triglycerides had shot through the roof to dangerous levels, because my weight had gone up and my activity down.

My doctor wanted to put me on medication. But I had spent too many years helping to manage my parents’ medications, and didn’t want to go down that road myself. So I did a little dietary research and made a plan. Now, I eat virtually nothing containing white flour or added sugar. I eat lean proteins, beans, nuts, and whole grains. And the main ingredient in my diet? Fresh vegetables. If I decide I need a snack in the evening, it’s often a small dish of broccoli with a drizzle of ponzu.

No, I’m not kidding. It’s become something of a joke in our household.

Needless to say, giving up some kind of food for Lent wouldn’t be much of an added discipline, and I’m not about to fast from broccoli (and neither should you — nice try!). But I knew exactly what I needed to do, what I needed to add rather than subtract.

Exercise.

Again, I added a simple goal, one that I knew I could keep: 20 ab crunches and 20 push-ups (or equivalent exercise) every day. I know, I know: to some of you that sounds like a pretty wimpy goal, and in a sense, it is. But as a guy pushing 70, I’m not trying to be an athlete or training for an Ironman. I am trying to be more disciplined in a way I already know I need to be.

We all know what we need to do to be more healthy, right? Eat right, get regular exercise, get a full night’s sleep. But we live in a world that challenges us at every turn. For example, my post-pandemic world still means more screen time than before the pandemic. And indeed, people are spending more and more time on their devices, playing games, checking their social media, and doom-scrolling. Some estimate that in 2025, on average, American adults will spend over 4 hours a day using apps on their phones.

Just think about it: what would you do if you had an additional 4 hours a day? Maybe go out for a walk?

And then there’s our food culture. It’s one thing to cook at home; it’s another to try to stick to healthy eating habits when you’re out. And unfortunately, that goes double for church. Whenever our group does a potluck event… well, let’s just say it’s hard for someone like myself to find anything I can eat unless we bring it.

. . .

IN THE SERMON on the Mount, Jesus addresses the various ways people engaged in religious behavior for the wrong reasons: it was less about devotion to God and more about getting the admiration of others. Similarly, we might engage a Lenten discipline in a similar way, doing it because it’s the supposedly religious thing to do, or because other people are doing it, without really knowing why.

Remember, the word “discipline” comes from the same root as “disciple” or “discipleship.” As believers, we are simultaneously citizens of God’s kingdom and citizens of this world. So much of what we do is habitual and unthinking; we reach for our cellphone, for the TV remote, for another potato chip. But being a disciple requires discipline and intentionality. We have to intentionally say yes to some things and no to others.

Along the lines of Matthew 6, it might be the discipline of private generosity, or prayer, or fasting. And we don’t need to draw a hard line between disciplines of the spirit and those of the body, for we should be good stewards of the bodies God gave us.

So if you haven’t done so already, think about an area of your life in which you know you could use more discipline and prayerfully take a step in the right direction. It’s one way of embodying a gospel truth: we no longer have to be slaves to our desires, nor to the values and habits we’ve absorbed from the world around us.