If your morning routine begins with a bowl of Frosted Flakes and you’ve decided to give up sweets for Lent, I’m sorry to inform you: you may already be off to a shaky start. And since Lent only began yesterday on Ash Wednesday, you’re only on Day 2!

Sugar on your cereal may not seem like much of an infraction. But 120 years ago today, on February 19, 1906, a family feud erupted over that very ingredient. What began at the breakfast table grew into a decades-long dispute that eventually landed in the courts.

At the center of the conflict were Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, physician and director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium, and his younger brother, Will Keith Kellogg, the more business-minded manager. In the 1890s, the brothers developed flaked cereal for sanitarium patients as part of a strict health regimen built on plain, unsweetened foods.

But visions diverged.

Will saw the potential for a popular breakfast product and wanted to make the flakes more appealing, which included adding sugar and salt. John, committed to his rigorous health principles and wary of sugar’s effects, strongly opposed sweetening the cereal.

When compromise proved impossible, Will struck out on his own. On this day in 1906, he founded the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company, which would eventually bear the Kellogg name. Lawsuits followed, based on who had the naming rights to use on the cereal box.

The feuding between brothers is not unfamiliar to those of us raised on biblical stories, and I’m not sure whether the Kellogg brothers ever reconciled over a bowl of cornflakes, but their story gives us something to chew on this Lenten season. What was lost in this push-and-pull over flavoring and corporate names? What does brotherhood mean in the Christian tradition? And when we sacrifice our personal material wants, what is it we stand to gain?

These forty days invite us into repentance and realignment. Lent asks: What truly shapes us? What flavors our daily habits? What needs adjusting?

So, after you enjoy your cereal — sweetened or not — I invite you to join us this Sunday, February 22, at 9:30 AM as we observe the First Sunday in Lent and continue our journey toward the cross with Christ. Please see the attached worship bulletin.

Blessings,

Pastor Marc