February 21, 2007
This Ash Wednesday service in the Book of Common Prayer is one of the few places in the contemporary Episcopal liturgy that we get a significant dose of the penitential flavor that marked earlier versions of our prayer book. Listen to this, from the confession from the older liturgy: “We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we from time to time most grievously have committed.” Compare that to the 1979 prayer book confession: “We confess that we have sinned against you.” There’s a little bit of a difference, don’t you think? The earlier versions, and the older liturgy, were much more focused on how bad we human beings are, how sinful – how wretched, to use the word that we hear in this Ash Wednesday service. You might have caught that from the collect that started this service: ‘create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness. . .’ But that’s the nature of Ash Wednesday. It is, of course, the day that we are reminded that we come from dust, and to dust we shall return. It is the beginning of the season when we are to prepare for Jesus’ death and resurrection, in the tradition of the early church, with ‘penitence and fasting.’ Now, normally, for the most part, I don’t go in for the breast-beating, we human beings are so horrible kind of thing. I think for many of us, that’s a message that is more damaging than useful, especially when it forms a steady part of the spiritual diet. But Ash Wednesday is different. It has a particular purpose, which is to re-orient us towards God. It is the annual time set aside to take stock: where am I with God? Am I close to God at this point? Am I farther away from God? How good a job am I actually doing at living out the promises made and renewed during baptism? Am I seeking and serving Christ in all people? Am I loving my neighbor as myself? Am I proclaiming by my word and my example the Good News of God in Christ? These are the kinds of questions we are encouraged – strongly encouraged – to ask of ourselves and each other on Ash Wednesday and during Lent. Not to give ourselves an A or a B-minus or a D-plus, but so that we can see where we need to pay more attention to God in our everyday lives. And there’s no mistaking that Ash Wednesday, and Lent, are good times to look at the second promise we make in our baptism: to persevere in resisting evil, and whenever we fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord. This is the orientation we are talking about: how oriented towards God am I, right now? Have I wandered away? If so, it’s time to start working my way back. God invites us back; all we have to do is take God up on the invitation. This is easier said than done, of course, and this is the day in our year when we are more focused on the repenting, the turning back to God.
Now, lest we start thinking that we are any better or any worse than other Christians in other times and other places, rest assured, God has seen it all before. There may be something quite discouraging in that thought, but maybe there’s something comforting in that too. Because here’s the thing: early on, when those first Christians were getting their communities organized and were very much on fire for Jesus, the Christ, there wasn’t a season of Lent. There was a three-year period that you spent studying and preparing to become a Christian, but there was no Lent. Jesus was expected back at any time, and it wasn’t that hard to keep the enthusiasm up for following him in the way, the way of life for Christians. But time went by, and more time, and no Jesus, and it got harder to stay focused on that way of life that followers of Jesus were to live. To help get believers re-focused on God, and to make sure Easter wasn’t just a big party that lacked meaning, that’s where Lent came in. A time of preparation. A time to reflect on where believers were with God. A reminder that there were certain challenges in the Christian life, and that one of those challenges is staying focused on God.
That’s where today’s readings come in. They are the reminder that those of us who believe in the God of Abraham and Sarah, and those who believe in Jesus Christ, have always had to do this taking stock, and see where their – our – actions measured up to what God expected from the faithful. First there’s the assessing, and then there’s the changing the way we behave, the way we live. Ash Wednesday, with its liturgy and its scripture lessons, wants us to pay attention to both.
Take the words we hear from the book of the prophet Isaiah. They are a real wake-up call to a people who had gotten very, very complacent in their observance of God’s teaching. Did you hear it? There’s God saying, “Yet day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God.” God is talking about the people who purport to be faithful. But here’s the question that these so-called faithful people ask, according to God: "Why do we fast, but you do not see? Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?" We’re doing what you’ve asked of us, God. Haven’t you noticed? We’re fasting. We’re following the letter of the law. What more do you want from us? How about giving us some credit here, God. But here’s what God has to say to that: “you serve your own interest on your fast day, and oppress all your workers. You fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist. Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high.” That is, you are outwardly conforming to my laws, God says – but it has not changed your heart. It has not oriented you towards me, God tells them. You fast, but you still oppress your workers. You fast, but you still quarrel with each other and strike with a wicked fist. You have not really turned to me, God tells them, which is what all the fasting, or other kinds of practices, are supposed to do. As God points out to the people: “Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the LORD?”
Here it is on Ash Wednesday, and we are being warned, by God in person, that we shouldn’t let the ashes on our foreheads go to our heads. An outward sign of our . . . piety, let’s say, does not mean much if it is not accompanied by a change of heart and the inward and outward actions that make it clear that we take God’s word seriously. Isaiah, speaking for God, gives us some specifics on this. God says, “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; when you see the naked, to cover them?” That’s the kind of fasting God wants: the signs of inner change, not just outward observance. And here’s the thing: it’s not too late. We can start now, to truly hear and respond to God’s call to us. There’s nothing stopping us. We can do this, and we can do it now. This is what Paul reminds us, in the second letter to the Corinthians. He’s talking about being reconciled with Christ, and what we’re supposed to do, and how we’re supposed to do it. And as for when, here’s what Paul says: “See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation!” This is it. It’s time. And here’s the promise that God makes to us, for when we finally get it, and when we finally start to do it. Back to Isaiah, listening to God: “If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The LORD will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.” Wow. Imagine that.
Now, this is not meant to be so ‘do what I say and be rewarded,’ so much as it is a ray of hope. We have it within us to live more like God, and if we do, our lives can be changed. That’s what God is saying to us, in this lesson from Isaiah. This is what Ash Wednesday is about.
Here’s what I think is the ultimate message to be heard in these lessons: it’s not too late. There is still time for us to change our ways, to change our hearts, to conform ourselves more and more to the ways of God, to the ways of Jesus Christ. Monastics call this process conversion, not as a one-time ‘aha’ but as a continuing process. Conversion – making our way of life conform more and more to God’s expectations and Jesus’ example – is an ongoing thing. It is never a one-time thing. And it’s never too late to start, or to start again. In the end, this Ash Wednesday liturgy, even with its heavy theme of repentance, is not to tell us how bad we are. It is to remind us that we may have lost our way, and that it’s time to come back. It’s time to return to God, and it is not too late. That is not a message of fear or damnation; instead, it is a message of hope. Turn to me, and live, God tells us. That’s the message of Ash Wednesday. May we hear it, and respond.
Amen.