Ash Wednesday

Introduction

I was 16 years old. Like many of my friends, I had just gotten my driver’s license. We were using our new found freedom and independence to do all the things that not having to depend on your parent for a ride offered.

I’d like to say we did really exciting stuff but we didn’t. But that doesn’t matter. The important thing was the freedom to do what we wanted, when we wanted. As long as we were home by curfew of course.

Often all we did was go to Denny’s. We’d order bottomless cups of coffee and plates of fries. And we’d hole up in our booth and just laugh and talk for hours.

One Friday night we were having one of these sessions. And a friend of mine casually mentioned she wasn’t eating meat on Fridays because it was Lent. It was part of her Catholic faith.

None of us knew what to make of this. For starters, none of us knew she was Catholic. There was nothing about her that was particularly devout. And second, if we knew that I don’t think it would have made much of a difference. None of us had the slightest notion of what fasting was about and we certainly didn’t know anything about Lent other than the name. We knew fasting meant not eating and that was about it.

We pushed her for details and she provided them where she could but the gist of it was “I don’t know. It’s just what we do.” There wasn’t any particular significance to the action beyond “this is what we do.”

It stayed with me though. It was definitely confusing to my 16-year old mind but there was something intriguing and meaningful about it. The fact that it didn’t make sense somehow made it all the more powerful.

Introduction to Ash Wednesday

Today is Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday begins the season of Lent.

The name "Ash Wednesday” comes from the imposition of ashes on our foreheads. Later in the service we’re going to have an opportunity to come forward and receive this rite. The receiving of ashes on our foreheads symbolizes our repentance and mourning and leads us into the season of Lent.

In the Christian Calendar, Lent is the 40 days leading up to Easter. It’s a period marked by fasting and preparation for Easter. We enter into the life, death, and suffering of Jesus Christ and look forward to his repentance.

Isaiah 58

In the passage Brian just read, God commands Isaiah to speak to the people of Israel. As is usually the case with the book of Isaiah, God had an issue with them.

God’s specific complaint was that Israel was fasting and expecting something from God in return. And when they got nothing in return, they were complaining to God.

“God, we’re going hungry here! We’re not eating! We’re doing it for you! How come you don’t notice? How come you’re not richly rewarding us?”

Israel had some magical thinking: If I do this one thing, I can get something out of it. It was like some sort of perverse workout routine. But when it didn’t work they got angry.

I relate to this idea of magical thinking.

When I was in college I spent one of my Spring Breaks praying and fasting for all the mission trips that the INN University Ministries were going on that Spring Break. I organized 24 hour prayer chains.

I don’t think there was anything especially wrong with this. I was new in my faith. I was eager. But there was definitely magical thinking going on: look at all the fun things I could be doing on Spring Break God! Yet I’m here. Fasting. I’m getting up in the middle of the night to prayer. I fully expected God to do something marvelous in return. I was doing something for God. God should do something in return.

What God has Isaiah do is turn the tables.

“Sure,” he says, “you’re fasting. But lets look at what else you’re doing:”

Looking out for your own interests? Check.

Oppressing your workers? Check.

Fighting and quarrelling with each other? Check.

God’s like “you’ve got to be kidding me!”

And he proposes another type of fast. He proposes something for than a performance to look holy.

God says, “I see you in your Sackcloth and ashes but its a show.”

The fasts that called Israel to are more than something you can put on your instagram feed. It’s more than changing your Facebook profile picture to show you support this or that.

Here’s the fast that God proposed instead:

Fighting injustice

Freeing those under institutionalized oppression

Releasing people from slavery

Giving food to the hungry

Housing the homeless

Feeding those who are cold and need clothes

Do those things, do those things and you’ll see the glory of the Lord.

Lenten Practices

God called out Israel for the empty performance of Sackcloth and Ashes. He calls it out as a play for attention.

Isn’t that our danger today as well?

We come together. We pray our prayers of repentance. We receive the ashes. Maybe you’ll go to Fred Meyer after the service and you’ll notice other people with smudges on their forehead you’ll nod at each other knowingly.

But what if we used this as a Lenten Practice to move toward something?

What if you went home, took a picture of your forehead, and you kept that picture just for yourself?

What if you used that picture as a reminder that God is calling you toward something, a new type of fasting?

What if this pushed us into a deeper and more radical place of justice.

What if we gave up your standard evening television watching to learn about issues of global injustice?

What if our reading was focused on learning more about historically oppressed people living in our country: POC, First Nations, immigrants, LGBTQ, the mentally ill.

Or what if you did a traditional fast and gave up something and you used that extra time or money to support causes of justice and freedom.

It’s incredibly easy to get discouraged about the state of the world today. It should shock us that a country is willing to invade another country. It should shock us that whether they’re serious or trying to court voters that any elected official would float the idea of what they’re considering to do to Trans youth and their families in Texas.

God’s promise to Israel via Isaiah is that they have a very real opportunity to be the light they wish to see in the world.

They have a real opportunity to be the ones to satisfy those in need.

They have a real opportunity to bring home.

Let me be clear here: I don’t think God was calling out Israel for their acts of fasting simply because God didn’t approve of those acts. I don’t see that God is forbidding physical acts of fasting or symbolic gestures of repentance. But God is adding an “And”. He’s saying “Do those things AND do this thing…AND when you do you’ll see what I’m really about.”

Our challenge today and throughout Lent is to identify those areas where we’re empty performers hoping to get something out of it and confess and repent and turn to something new and different.