Day 26: Should I have an energy drink?

So.... I gave up soda / pop for Lent,  but I explicitly decided not to give up caffiene this year.  

This left a nice alternative to drink tea on sleepy mornings or get some Starbucks when I want to sit and work for a while.  

The last week has left me more exhausted than I can remember being in a long time and I woke up one morning especially groggy on a busy day.  It didn't feel like tea was going to cut it and a I went in the pantry to get stuff for kids lunches I found some natural energy drinks that I had gotten to try out some time ago.  

Hmmm..... it's not pop. It's surely not the diet coke that I specifically had in mind when I gave up soda for Lent.  

On the other hand,  it's not tea.  It's not really the thing I intended to drink as an alternative when I need a little pick up.  

Maybe I should have just given up caffiene all together...

These kinds of conversations are an inevitable part of a lenten practice.  To struggle with the letter of the law,  the nature of the law,  human nature.  

One point of a fasting practice is to draw awareness to our human nature. There is a surface part of will power,  but Lent is deeper than will power.  We ultimately fail at will power when we are tired or stressed.... but fasting focuses me on the hunger.  Why do I want this thing? It focuses me on the gap created by a change in routine... how is my life made different by giving up this thing? Wrestling with these questions tells me new things about myself and my relationship with God.  

I've been wrestling a lot with the nature of sin. In the old testament,  sin is pretty clearly connected to following the law. The 10 commandments and other laws in deuteronomy. In the new testament,  sin is more amorphous both more and less than the law.  

Take the commandment,  thou shall not kill. Can you think of any exceptions when it is ok to kill? When it is not a sin to kill? What about things that aren't killing that are sins that break the sentiment of this command. 

For some people,  this creates a legalistic loophole where it is possible to pick and choose parts of the law that still must be followed and which rules are no longer relevant.  For others,  this creates a tighter straight jacket of the law requiring a deeper,  unobtainable holiness. For still others,  grace allows the law to be tossed completely - I'm a sinner anyway so why try?

I think fasting ... and the law... are there to ask us questions of ourselves.  Why is my nature this way? What is good in my nature,  what is dark? What do I hunger for? What do I use to block out hard questions or deep thoughts? 

And the very moment I start to get legalistic, it's the moment I can be aware of my nature rubbing up against something.  Hmmmmm......

What's the verdict,  should I be allowed an energy drink?