Sermon Notes Ash Wednesday 2021

Sermon Notes Ash Wednesday, Feb 17, 2021 In case you haven't heard, today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. You may not have noticed because every day has seemed like Lent for the past year. Preachers everywhere are having difficulty encouraging their congregants to give something up for Lent this year, because there's not much left to give up. We've given up travel, socializing, eating out. Many have even given up coming to church. Of course we have put on a few things also: a few pounds, some slothful habits, and a growing sense of despondency. We come to this Lent a bit fatigued, tired. Nobody really wants to hear their priest sounding like Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day: six more weeks of Lent. So lets start by setting aside our emotions and see if we can recover the real meaning of Lent, and have something to sustain us as we draw ever closer to our Lord's death and resurrection. Here's the first meaning: even though we are asked to focus on ourselves, especially our sinful natures, Lent isn't about us. It's about Jesus' claim on us. It's about approaching him to share in his death and participate in his resurrection. That is a holy task indeed and Ash Wednesday begins it by asking us to be authentic. Jesus said, "Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven." Matt. 6:1. What a call on us! Jesus asks us to undo most of what we have spent our entire lives trying to do: being agreeable, fitting in, having others like us. There's a favorite commercial of mine that invites us to dance as if no one is watching. Jesus invites us to practice our goodness as if no is watching. If I stop and think about that I realize I don't even know what that means. To live righteously as if it didn't matter. It does matter, of course. It matters to Jesus. But it doesn't matter to anyone else. Such an idea forces me to ask, "How much of what I do for the Lord is posturing for others?" I need to make myself small. Forgetable. On Ash Wednesday we hear repeated the pronouncement of God on all mankind after the Fall in Genesis. "Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return." Be small. Small as a speck of dust. Now you are ready to begin. Jesus said, "When you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Matt 6:3,4. Here is something for us to do, not just be. When we are insignificant enough that it makes no difference, we can actually do something that will make a difference. In the blessing of the ashes that follows this sermon, we will ask Almighty God for two things: that these ashes may be a symbol of our mortality, that is our smallness. And a sign of our penitence. That word "penitence" could use a good PR man. It has been much maligned over the centuries. The Medieval Catholic church twisted it around to be a gambit for rewards. Penitence could earn us God's favor. The Reformers correctly reasoned that God's grace is given irrespective of our merit, and our penitence does not earn us anything. The concept of penance was squeezed at both ends: neither an IOU from God, nor a worthless pawn ticket. Ash Wednesday recovers something valuable about penitence. When we give as Jesus instructs us, in humility and without expectation, we practice penitence as it is intended. A pure act of love returned by us to God for his love given to us. The ashes imposed on our forehead remind us to love God as purely as we are able. It is something we do because of God's love: we give to others. And our left hand does not know what our right hand gives. Jesus said, "When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Matt. 6: 6. Lent is about preparing us to be with Jesus. To do that, we need to be where Jesus is. We need to seek the company of Jesus, not of men. I once heard Thomas Keating speak on this passage and he said your room could be anywhere or nowhere. It could be your own head. But it could not be crowded. It was just Jesus and you. He then led us in an exercise of Centering Prayer where a whole room full of people met Jesus privately, in their own rooms. On Ash Wednesday we begin to practice being alone with Jesus. We need to practice because we aren't very good at it and many of us do not have much experience being alone with Jesus. The whole progression of Lent through Holy Week and finally to the crucifixion is toward the loneliness of Jesus. One by one we will see Jesus deserted by his followers, rejected by those he came to save, and finally isolated even from his Father in Heaven. If our intention is to walk that walk with Jesus we need to know what it's like being alone with him. Jesus said, "When you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. Matt. 6:17,18. I believe it was Dallas Willard who said, "You can't call yourself a good preacher and a lover of Jesus in the same sentence." To be a lover of Jesus means we have to be non-lover of ourselves. The modern notion of loving ourselves before we can love others is antithetic to Jesus' teaching on the subject. It doesn't take too much unpacking to see that Jesus was speaking against those who sought to love themselves by practicing a very visible piety. This is tricky ground to walk through, especially on Ash Wednesday. Today we display ashes, symbols of our piety, for all the world to see. Can we do that so the world sees the ashes and not us behind the ashes? We can if we remember that we are small and penitential. Jesus said, "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. Matt 6:21. He said this in contrast to a world where value is ephemeral and fleeting. We need the reminder of Ash Wednesday to keep our priorities straight. In the deep symbolism of the church's tradition, this year's ashes were last year's palm fronds. Our praise was genuine but short-lived. Palm branches to ashes. But the story is not over, the ashes have one more act before they are discarded. They become the cross on our forehead. They become the symbol of our redemption, our true heart's treasure. As this Ash Wednesday comes to a close and our Lenten walk begins, let us remember that Lent is not about us, but about the One who loves us and died for us. He's granted us this time, these 40 days, to put in practice the life he's called us to live. May we joy in discovering how rich that can be. Amen.