Ash Wednesday Sermon - Pastor Erin Bovendam - Calvary Lutheran

0:00from Matthew chapter six. Jesus said to the disciples, beware of practicing your righteousness 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 in the synagogues and in the streets so that they may be praised by others, truly I tell you they have received their reward. But when you give alms and these are things taking care of those who are struggling with poverty or who are in need, when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your alms may be done in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. 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. But whenever you pray go into

1:00your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. And whenever you fast to do not look somber like the hypocrites, for they mark their faces to show others that they are fasting, truly I tell you they have received their reward. But when you fast put oil on your head and wash your face so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. 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 also the gospel of the Lord. You may be seated. So we don't read this gospel every year on Ash Wednesday but it is the assigned reading every year on

2:05Ash Wednesday for many churches including Calvary. We just typically don't read it. And I always find it's a little funny that Ash Wednesday of all days is the day we choose to read these words from Jesus because Jesus tells us not to show off our faithfulness not to have displays of faith and then we all come forward and we get a sign of the cross that everyone can see. In our gospel reading Jesus mentions that actions of faith are needed like prayer and taking care of those who have needs. Those are valuable things but in each case he encourages us to not be like quote hypocrites. And I think it's important to know what that word meant back in Jesus' day. So in Jesus' time he uses the word three times in this reading. In Jesus' time the word hypocrit had a little bit different meeting. It originally referred to stage actors those who perform for an audience. So how many of you here have ever been in a play or a musical have ever performed? If you don't want to admit it because if you were back in that day

3:08you'd be called a hypocrit but it had a totally different meaning. So Jesus wasn't critiquing the stage actors of his day but he was critiquing those who perform acts of faith as if they were on a stage to show off for others instead of being focused on the relationship with God. There's a new devotion that was put out by the homeless and justice network of the ELCA and someone who wrote a devotion in that reverend Imani O'Leary. He writes that faith is not a performance but something lived in relationship. That this time of Lent these 40 days that we we mark before Easter it's a time to turn toward our neighbor. A time to return to community and as he says not the idea of community but the daily work of building and repairing community. And while we receive ashes tonight as a visible sign of faith we all come forward to receive it

4:10together. We receive these ashes not meant to show off our faith but it's a sign that we all admit that not all is well in our lives and not all is well in our world. These ashes might be a sign of solidarity with each other our solidarity as human beings. People gathered here but also thousands of people across the world who are coming together this day this night to receive that sign of that cross to receive the ashes together as one people. I started today with a devotion that popped into my email written by author Kate Bollard and she shared about Ashwin's day. She talked about an ache that we have as human beings an ache that doesn't go away. Our aches may change over the years we grieve or we struggle or we have different challenges and she talked about

5:11how perhaps we think that one day we're looking ahead to one day we will have arrived. One day when we'll have it all figured out or we'll be free from challenges or our challenges won't bother us so much because we'll be so full of faith we'll get there one day and she writes but lent these 40 days before Easter she says lent interrupts that wonderful fantasy she says lent doesn't promise relief it doesn't offer a five step plan for greatness it simply invites honesty 40 days to stop pretending that we are fine 40 days to stop pretending that we're in control that we can outrun our limits with just enough discipline or optimism and one more thing she says lent is a season that tells the truth about what it means to be human we are limited we are dependent we are unfinished that's our state as human beings it's a season that refuses

6:14the cultural lie that everything is solvable if we just try harder think better thoughts or if we could order our lives more carefully and I would say that lent and Ashwin's day remind us that all of our hope is on God so in a little while we'll get to come forward and receive those ashes in the sign of the cross that the aches and the hurts that we experience are not the last word for us but Jesus Christ our life in him that is the last word for us and he goes with us through it all we all walk the way of the cross which centers our lives in a God who is for us and then it moves us out to a hurting world so that we can be there for the world and as a sign of hope for each other we shift gears just a little bit several years ago when I lived in Pennsylvania I discovered my

7:14new favorite flower it's a blue hydrangea there's these gorgeous blue hydrangea bushes in the place where we lived in Pennsylvania and I just loved them and one year we planted them and it grew and it grew the next year as well and then we moved to Minnesota so a few years after being here somebody gave me a blue hydrangea it actually had been a decoration for one of our Easter services and someone gave it to me and I planted it outside and Lil Johnson who's a part of our church here and also really good with plants unlike myself Lil warned me that that variety of hydrangea probably was not going to grow here but I didn't listen I persisted I put blankets on it in the spring and in the fall to keep it from all the frost I watered it I nourished it and each year it would come back with some green leaves and it would be about this tall and no buds at all so low wisely said again to me this year I think it's like an indoor plant maybe

8:16or for a warmer place so I finally listened and I repotted it and I again have been taking care of it for six months and last week I got the tiniest bud you can imagine and then I watered it again and here it is this week and the part that bud it is just not not doing good in a sense I've kind of treasured this plant I've taken so much care of it in our guest reading today Jesus said where your treasure is there your heart will be also I'm not sure I wanted my heart to go there but somebody once interpreted that verse to mean that where you put your treasure your time your energy your resources where you put those things your heart will follow so where do you want your heart to be put your treasure there

9:17I've been putting all this time and energy and a little money into this plant and I can't quite let it go but I'm afraid that perhaps all of my care has been misplaced because it's kind of come to nothing and it makes me wonder if there's times when we keep pouring ourselves into things treasureing things investing in things that end up not amounting to much that really aren't life-giving or even good for us or the people around us if you think about your own life when or times you've invested yourself and invested yourself well and when it been times when you've poured yourself into something that hasn't been so life-giving for you or others but has really been life draining there's a Bible verse that I kept thinking of and it goes like this it says take hold of the life that really is life I couldn't remember where it came from so I

10:17looked it up it's from 1st Timothy chapter 6 and the context of it is for those who have much for those who have plenty like like a lot of us here they're told to not set their hopes on riches but to set their hopes on God and then the author writes that for those who have much we are to do good be rich in good works generous and ready to share thus storing up for ourselves the treasures of a good foundation so that we may take hold of the life that really is life to focus our attention to nurture our awareness of Jesus who is our life that really is life when I start thinking about what I invest myself in and I don't know if you might feel the same way when I think especially about my time there's a lot of things that I invest my time in that I later regret most notably like scrolling through social media or maybe searching the internet for some quick fix to life's problems that doesn't really turn out well there've been times I've regretted

11:20ways I've spent my time there but as I thought about it more I realized and I don't know if you're in the same boat but I realized I don't think I've ever regretted anytime I've spent in prayer alone with God ever I don't think there's ever been a time when I've sat down and read the Bible and I've looked back and regretted that time I don't think there's ever been a time when I've had to go and serve someone or help somebody that I ever regretted it now of course there might have been times when I maybe wasn't super motivated to go or didn't treasure it but looking back I've never regretted investing that time in my part of my relationship with God or tending to care for others last May I received a gift from some of you some of you are in our younger youth group and you brought May flowers to people like on Mayday anybody do that raise your hand if you did that did anybody bring it to my house somebody brought it to my house so I got this beautiful plant that

12:25the students brought and it was in a cardboard small container and I kept it alive in that container for three months in my house so I would water it and it would like spring to life and then by the end of the next week I'm like oh that plant is just done for it's like drooping and I'd water again it's spring to life and it surprised me every single week and then finally at the end of the summer I replanted it finally took the time to do that and it just took off flowering all winter long and it's kind of this like amazing view of summer in my house the surprising and amazing thing that brings me joy and I wonder you know I haven't tended to chew it a lot I water it a little bit here and there maybe I'll put some fertilizer around it once in a while but again it just like kind of gives me this joy and I wonder if that is kind of like how our relationship with God

13:28is that it's amazingly and surprisingly life giving for us it's there for us even when it doesn't seem plausible or possible when we think about Ashwin's day it reminds us that his cape roller puts it today we can tell the truth we can tell the truth if we are tired if we are longing if we are not finished she says the hurts and the aches of life aren't going away but neither is God's grace this time of lent may we take a hold of the life that really is life and keep coming back and tending to our awareness of Jesus who remains with us always working for our good and for the good of this world even in those times when we can't quite see it amen