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Ash Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21, Walter Harms
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A LOOK AT OUR PIETY

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of a 40 day time span that ends on the eve of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead. The “ash” of Ash Wednesday implies something destroyed, demolished, gone. Not only destroyed are the palms of the previous year’s Palm Sunday’s palms, but also destroyed was the life of a person, a man, a figure we can never fully even begin to comprehend the God-man, Jesus. It is well that you and I contemplate, meditate upon, and spend time and effort on the astounding attitude of the person dying for us, what it means, and then fall down “in humble adoration” before the Lord God.

The 40 days of Lent has been in the church since the time of Pope Gregory the Great (540~604). The 40 days remember the 40 days of temptation of our Lord when he fasted and prayed. And so should we, every year, fast and pray in special ways to honor our Lord’s life — his suffering, dying, his death and his time in the grave — all for us. Then we shall be able to experience with joy beyond our description the end of our death, our grave, our hell, our sin, as we shout out: “He is risen! He is risen indeed! Hallelujah!”

The Word of God in front of us this day speaks about sacrifice (almsgiving), praying, and fasting. Our Lord gave up the glories of heaven to save us in that great act of love on the cross, for no man has greater love than to give his life for another. Often found in prayer of which we know the contents but little, except for that three fold prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, and his prayer as our great high priest immediately before in the Room of the Passover. Several times it is mentioned that both Jesus and his disciples had no time to eat and had fasting imposed on themselves.

In our 40 days of Lent this year, I would like us to look at our piety — how we demonstrate our faithfulness, our actions inspired by our devotion to this Jesus, our humble respect as we view the One who was there before the world began and whose word brought creation and us into existence travel the Via Dolorosa to Calvary, the cross and the grave.

Our Almsgiving

“All the church wants is money.” Well, I suppose the answer to that is “yes!” that is most dear to our hearts, the love of which drives us to infamy and worse, needs to be given to our Lord. Totally, all of it, none kept back in an Ananias-and-Sapphira way of doing things. We all know what happened to Lot’s wife when she cast the mournful eye on the treasures she was losing, in order to “save” her life.

In a culture which reveres wealth and its acquisition more than it reveres the Lord God, our giving needs to be examined. I remember the days when the giving of each adult person in the local congregation was published at the end of the year. As a pastor I have looked at the giving of people so that they would have a record to honor any inquiries from the Internal Revenue Service. I have been shocked!

I wonder if God was looking at what was given, (what you are giving) and asked, (because God who knows the hearts and minds of men, including ours): “Is this how this family honors me?” Would our Savior say: “This people honor me with their lips, but their hearts [where their treasure is] is far from me”?

In this day and time when few people know what we give, we can fool ourselves, we can present a picture of giving which fools others, and we can fool both ourselves and others.

Examine your giving during this season of Lent. As we do I would hope that we arrive at the conclusion that we give far too little. We have probably indeed said to ourselves, “Eat, drink, and be merry! You deserve the good times for all your hard work.” And if we arrive at some area in the region called “Guilt,” then remember why we observe Lent. We need to see the evil, greed, selfishness of our poor management of all resources God has given for us to use for the short time of our living heaped up this person on the cross by our gracious God and obliterated, “remembered no more!”

Examine your giving well during Lent and let your giving truly honor the Savior!

Our Praying

The prayer life of the pious Jew consisted of the Shema: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord,.” This was said in the morning and evening. Hourly prayers were spoken at 9 AM, 12 PM and 3 PM. There were prayers before and after meals. Many prayers were spoken during the worship of God in the synagogue (their church) worship, and, of course, many prayers were spoken on special occasions as well.

In order to demonstrate how pious you were, you found yourself in the market place, the mall, the cafeteria at 9, 12 and 3, when suddenly you dropped everything and prayed. How pious you looked! And you might have been, but you got what you wanted from those prayers. Your payment in full, your reward for praying was for people to think you were pious. That was all they got. Nothing from God.

Prayer in communication with God, the God who loved you so much he gave his one and only Son into death, that we might be with him always. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.

Lent is a time to spend time reviewing, possibly repairing, perhaps enlarging your time of communication with God. Is it possible that we view our sin and the sacrifice which eliminated all alienation from God so lightly that we do not think speaking to him is a peripheral, nonessential, a marginal, an unimportant part of daily existence?

I have prayed and grown weary of daily routines which demand going through certain rituals. I have not stopped praying. I do not need to pray more. I need to be more totally aware of this gracious God acting, moving, with me in my every day life and routine.

If Jesus needed to pray and he prayed often, alone, in worship and with disciples, prayer should be a highly important, essential, central part of our life.

Examine your prayer life during this Lenten season and give serious thought to what part God in Christ has to do with every day’s privilege of God’s gift to you.

Our Fasting

Martin Luther, in his Small Catechism where he wrote about being prepared to receive the Lord’s Supper, states: “Fasting and bodily preparation are indeed a fine outward training, but he that is worthy and well-prepared has faith in these words, ‘Given and shed for you for the remission of sins.’” Faith is giving up, getting rid of dependence on and ending indulging in all kinds of sinful stuff, such as worry, gossip, greed, spiteful criticism of others, an unforgiving spirit, and so much more. That kind of fasting is most highly recommended at any time of the year

Fasting, in the more tradition sense, is not starving, but rather simply not eating whatever foods you decide not to eat during these 40 days. This kind of fasting is very simply to remind us of what our Lord gave up, his life as a ransom for all of mankind.

This kind of fasting may also urge us to be alert to the fact of the starving millions who die of hunger, of the lack of spiritual food to far too many people in the little world we live in, and cause us to share all that we have with others, particularly our faith in the gracious God who gave up his life for us, to us and in us, so that we might live.

Examine your plate of foods, fantasies you enjoy and give up for Lent, for Jesus, for the glory of God and the salvation of others.

Take a look, a hard look at your piety during these 40 days, and use a good oil. Amen.

Walter W. Harms, retired pastor
Austin, TX USA
Comments: waltpast@aol.com

 


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