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Good morning everybody, this is Heidi St. John Happy Valentine's Day!

You guys, happy Valentine's Day, and you're quickly sending your husband a text. I'll just let you do that.

We have a jam-packed podcast for you today. Today we're going to be talking about week six of the Mom Strong International Bible Study, but before we do that, there is a ton of news that I want to get to particularly going to be important to homeschoolers.

And so I hope you guys will take notes today, stick around, I think you're going to be encouraged.

Alright, so there's a bunch of news I want to get to today before we get to week six of the Bible Study, because there are so many things important things that are happening right now around you, particularly for homeschooling families.

Today also marks the beginning of Lent. Did you guys know that this year? Catholics for sure will appreciate that.

But this season of Lent, which is the weeks where Christians fast and give up worldly pleasures, begins today on Valentine's Day.

A lot of you guys don't understand what Lent is, and it represents the 40 days that Jesus wanted in the desert, praying and fasting after he was baptized.

So a lot of Christians participate in Lent. And this year it's a little bit shorter than usual. It begins today on February 14th and ends on March 29th, which is called Holy Thursday, when Catholics will celebrate a mass to represent Jesus' last.

So interesting, I have friends who are not Catholic that participate in Lent. And basically they're what they tell me is that it helps them to really focus on things in their life that they want to give up in order to pay attention to the things in their life that are not so good that they're trying to work their way through.

So it's interesting to me also, like I said, I grew up in an evangelical home in a Baptist church, really, and we didn't participate in Lent.

And so I always wondered why the ashes, what is the deal with Ash Wednesday? And so I thought, we'll talk about that for just a half a second because I got to move on.

But the ashes represent two biblical themes. The first comes from saying, remember you are a dust and to dust, you shall return.

Hey, you know what, we should all remember that, right? Which is a passage that underscored that life is temporary and should be lived correctly.

The ashes also pay respect and draw attention to penance. So when someone repented their sins, it used to be a custom for them to dress in itchy sackcloth like a potato bag. And said in ashes, do you guys remember the story of Esther when Mordecai found out that the Jews were going to be killed because Hayman

was mad at Mordecai. So why, you know, why just punish Mordecai? Why not exterminate the entire Jewish, Jewish people? He dressed in sackcloth and ashes and he sat at the city gates. And if you guys have ever wondered, what the heck, what's the sackcloth and ashes thing? That's it. It's basically saying, oh my goodness, I'm repenting in my sins.

I realize that I'm a mess and I need forgiveness. So anyway, for those of you who are participating in Lent, don't let it sneak up on you. It starts today. Also, I wanted to really quickly let you know of something that's happening right now in Hawaii.

That this is important. I first heard about this last week from a listener. And since then, I've received lots of Facebook messages and emails from you. And I wanted you to know I am aware of what's going on. I also know that everybody who's anybody that defends homeschooling is also aware of what's happening in Hawaii. And obviously this is a, this is a backlash, which we talked about this a couple of weeks ago. You guys, we knew this was going to come.

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