ASH Wednesday 2017

“Dust you are and to dust you will return.  Repent and believe the gospel.”

Jesus emerged from his baptism and was immediately led into the wilderness where he was tempted, tested, for forty days. In those days he fasted.  Our forty days parallel Jesus’s forty days. Like him, our days are to be marked with fasting or self-denial. This is why the tradition of “giving up” something.

So let’s not trivialize the giving-up like our culture tends to try to trivialize, commercialize, or weaponize almost everything else.  A friend of mine pointed out some new trends for Lent which include “Lent selfies” and “Ash-tags for Lent” which he finds particularly atrocious and I agree.

Jesus went to the wilderness where he would be tested at the point of his identity. God said at his baptism, “You are my Son.”  Satan would challenge that. The enemy will test you and challenge you at the point of who you are, who you think you are, and whose you are.

When you ask what you should give up for Lent, it’s not that complicated: be prepared to give up, set aside, let go of, or forsake whatever it is that is keeping you from being and becoming who you really are. Our true self is obscured by the false self that we present to the world. That is why the mask is a symbol of the pre-Lenten celebration of Mardi Gras.  We are not asked to give up chewing gum or chocolate or red meat or clean out our closets or learn to jump on one foot. It’s much more serious than that: we are asked to give up the masks that we hide behind.

Frederick Buechner has said, ‘During Lent, Christians are supposed to ask, one way or another, what it means to be themselves.”

What might it be that is keeping you from becoming who you really are? What is preventing you from staying on the path to fulfill God’s loving purpose for your life? That can be some habit, a preoccupation, an obsession, a distraction, a pet sin, an old wound, some hate, rage or bitterness, or even a relationship that has become stifling and unhealthy rather than life-giving. 

The ashes of Ash Wednesday are an ancient and biblical sign of repentance and a symbol of mortality, reminding us of the brevity and preciousness of this earthly life, reminding us that life is short and each day of it is a precious gift of God that should treated with reverence and care.  We are on loan to each other for a time; we belong ultimately to God and to God we will one day return.  Life is a gift and each day contains an opportunity to become the person God knows we already are – that is, if we remove the impediments and the distractions.

So when you are praying and asking God what your Lenten practice for this year should be, ask: where is the sacrifice in this? Where is the self-denial for the sake of fulfilling God’s loving purpose for my life? How does this contribute to the emergence and growth of my true self as a child of God?  Then make your choice and ask God for the grace to see it through all the way to Easter.

Yours in Christ,

Dr. Bill >)))’>