2 Cor. 5:20b-6:10
Matt 6:1-6, 16-21
Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, that season of penitence and preparation leading into the acts of Holy Week, culminating in Easter and the Feast of our Lord’s Resurrection from the dead. Everyone knows that any big occasion requires much preparation and forethought. Whether it’s Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Easter, there’s always a lot to do – food to prepare, cleaning to be done, perhaps the home needs to be decorated. The Church realized this about the great Feasts of Christmas and Easter, and instituted the penitential seasons of Advent and Lent to precede them. This gives us the space to prepare our hearts, clean our spiritual homes, and even get ready to deck our souls with gladness.
As a child, I always wondered about the great seasons of Advent and Lent. Advent was pretty easy to understand due to its name “Advent”, since I knew advent meant an arrival. Lent was not so easy to figure out. The Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church helped me there, with this exhortation for Ash Wednesday:
Dear People of God: The first Christians observed with great devotion
the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and it became the custom
of the Church to prepare for them by a season of penitence and fasting.
This season of Lent provided a time in which converts to the faith were
prepared for Holy Baptism. It was also a time when those who, because
of notorious sins, had been separated from the body of the faithful were
reconciled by penitence and forgiveness, and restored to the fellowship of
the Church. Thereby, the whole congregations was put in mind of the
message of pardon and absolution set forth in the Gospel of our Saviour,
and of the need which all Christians have to renew their repentance and faith.
The practice of putting ashes on the forehead of clergy and congregation became a sign and symbol of the mourning and penitence for sinfulness, echoing ancient practices found in the Bible. Surely you recall the stories of people wearing sackcloth and putting ashes on their heads to show their sorrow? This became a modern-day equivalent.
Now, growing up as an Episcopalian in the 1960s, getting ashes on Ash Wednesday wasn’t part of my family or church tradition. My Roman Catholic friends would come to school with smudges on their faces, and we Protestants would gather round them and ask about what seemed to us a bizarre practice. “It’s to remind us that one day we’ll die,” they told us. To a six year old that doesn’t mean anything – death has little reality. So I never thought about getting ashes until I was in college. Then I wanted to know, and perhaps some of you do too, why do we continue this practice of penitence to begin the Lenten season?
In that portion of his second letter to the Corinthians appointed for this day, Paul writes, “We entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says, ‘At an acceptable time I have listened to you, and on a day of salvation I have helped you.’ See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation!”
Already we have been saved, but not yet has it been realized. The call is to be reconciled to God, to accept that salvation has come in the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. How can we realize that salvation? accept that call? One way is by admitting our sinful natures, the willfulness that draws us away from right decision and right action and down the pathway of error. We examine our hearts and our lives, to see where we might have gone astray from following in the footsteps of Jesus. And because we are called to salvation as a people, for God did not call individual Israelites out of Egypt but the whole nation… Because we are called to salvation within a community of faith, it is only fitting that we answer the call to reconciliation with God and acceptance of that salvation as a community. This service on Ash Wednesday gives us that chance, to bear witness to the realization that we are a sinful people, to show willingness to work to change our behavior, to repent and return to the Lord. We receive ashes on our foreheads in token of this desire. The ashes are an outward reminder of our inward commitment.
But it doesn’t end with Ash Wednesday. The call should resonate in our hearts and minds throughout the entire season of Lent. Paul continues in his letter to remind the Corinthians that great endurance is required if we are to persevere. He also tells us how we’re able to persevere, namely, “by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God.” We not alone in this endeavor since we have our sisters and brothers in Christ, but it is by the power of God that these things will come to pass. God is with us.
And so we mark our foreheads with ashes at the beginning of this endurance race of Lent, empowered by God and knowing we will be doing righteous things as we prepare for Easter, fasting and praying and increasing our religious devotions and charitable giving.
But… but… what do the words of our Gospel say about all of this? “Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven. So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you , as the hypocrites do… Truly I tell you, they have received their reward… And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward… And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward…”
So is our wearing of ashes to put on a show? That’s the question Jesus would have each of us answer about any and all Lenten observances. Are we doing them because God has called you into reconciliation, or are we doing them because we want others to notice us as being ‘good’ Christians? It’s a matter of intent with Jesus. The practices are good and recommended and commended to us by Jewish custom and by God’s invitation. It’s a matter of who you want watching your devotions > the people surrounding you or God. If you want recognition, Jesus says you’ll get that, but you’ll need to be content with that since you won’t get anything else from God. But if you are aiming to get God’s attention, then you need to do these things without any show or fuss; try to keep a low profile among others, and don’t worry about their reactions to what you do. Worry about your heart. Worry about your soul. Be reconciled to God in the privacy of your relationship with God, and you will receive God’s reward.
Paul tells us in his letter that working for reconciliation and for God will have the exact opposite effect from being noticed by the community as a good Christian. He writes, “We are treated as imposters, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see – we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.” The externals are not important, for God knows each persons heart, and as often happens within the kingdom of God, the heart is the opposite of the external appearance. Reality is flipped on its head. We will seem to have nothing, but we will possess everything.
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be.”
Consider these things, ponder these things, and keep them in your heart, as you walk out into the world to keep a holy Lent.
