Thursday, February 15, 2018

Ash Wednesday Sermon

Heavenly Father, may we seek you and find you, may we knock and the door be opened, for we are sojourners looking for your Kingdom. As we encounter suffering in this world, turn our hearts, our ears, our eyes, our souls toward Christ, who emptied himself, and was tempted, and suffered for us, even giving his own life. In this suffering, plant seeds of hope, and let us never stray so far into despair, that we forget the resurrection of Christ and the power of his Spirit. Amen. (written by Thomas)

5 times a day – I get a random notification on my phone: “Don’t forget, you’re going to die.”

The app says that in Bhutan (near Nepal) – contemplating death five times daily brings happiness. For me, it’s not about happiness but humility. And on this day, as ashes are placed on our foreheads, that little phrase is reminder that even when we wash the ashes off later, the mark is still there reminding us of our mortality.

I think of Mary Oliver’s words in her poem “Sometimes.”

Death waits for me, I know it, around
one corner or another.
This doesn’t amuse me.
Neither does it frighten me.

“Don’t forget, you’re going to die.” – It doesn’t scare me nor do I think it bad luck to see that phrase - that little saying helps me pause and give me some perspective on life. Likewise ashes on our foreheads should give us pause this day to reflect on our lives. Life that is so often full.

Like Mary Oliver who ponders her stuff in her poem “Storage”

What does one do with all the stuff?
I rented a storage space. And filled it. Years passed ...
As I grew older the things I cared about grew fewer, but were more important.
So one day I undid the lock and called the trash man. He took everything…

Don’t we all have too much stuff? Our attics, basements, storage lockers are filled. My book shelves are overflowing. Our time too seems so full, we are always running on to the next thing…

It is good for us to clean out such things from our lives but for Lent, we need take it a step further. What is the stuff that clutters our lives that holds us back from the abundant life that Jesus offers us?

What lock do we need to unfasten in ourselves so everything can be taken, stripped away from us, so that we have more room in our hearts for love? Jesus gives us hints in the Gospel for today…

Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them, Jesus says. So give alms, fast and pray but do it without blowing a trumpet, without letting everyone know what you are doing.
Those three simple practices are helpful for us – give alms, fast and pray. But do it quietly, away from the fanfare and consider what the prophet Isaiah says to us…

Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day… Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house…
The point Isaiah makes is that our fasting, praying and giving alms is to help those in need, the oppressed, the hungry and homeless. Our cleaning out our storage, our living into what Jesus calls us to do, is for the benefit of one another, not just for ourselves.

And maybe that is one of the things we need to give up, unlock in our hearts. This hyper-individuality that exists in our society that fails to look beyond what our own needs are, that focus on I and I alone.

I believe Jesus and Isaiah call us to go deeper. To look around and consider our lives as they connect with one another. So we give alms – we give away some of our money to benefit others this Lent – to end the hoarding that we can so easily do for ourselves. And we fast so others might be filled.

But what about prayer? I think of the poem Praying by Mary Oliver

It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch
a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway
into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

Our prayers are meant to be simple – but we do need to pay attention, then string a few words together – for prayer is a doorway into giving thanks for our lives and into a silence where the voice of God may speak to us.

Again in the words of Mary Oliver (Summer Day)

I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields…

Our prayer is to pay attention to our world and offer it to God.

A beautiful fire consumed the dry palm branches into the ashes for today’s service. May such a beautiful fire burn away the chafe and stuff that holds us back from what God wants us to be in God’s creation. So there will be more room in our hearts for love. So that through our prayers, our alms giving and fasting, this Lent we may come to know God more deeply, help others out more readily and find ourselves more free to fly and live.

Don’t forget that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Amen.

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