Sermon Archive

Readings for 21 February 2007
Ash Wednesday
Year C



  • First Lesson

    • Joel 2:1-2,12-17
    Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the LORD is coming, it is near-- a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness spread upon the mountains a great and powerful army comes; their like has never been from of old, nor will be again after them in ages to come. Yet even now, says the LORD, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the LORD, your God? Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Sanctify the congregation; assemble the aged; gather the children, even infants at the breast. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her canopy. Between the vestibule and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep. Let them say, "Spare your people, O LORD, and do not make your heritage a mockery, a byword among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples, `Where is their God?'"

  • Second Lesson

    • 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10
    We entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

    As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says,

    "At an acceptable time I have listened to you,and on a day of salvation I have helped you."

    See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation! We are putting no obstacle in anyone's way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way: through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honor and dishonor, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see-- we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

  • Gospel

    • Matthew 6:1-6,16-21
    Jesus said, "Beware of practicing your piety 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, 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 your 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, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as 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."

  • Sermon
    • Sermon
    The Rev. Susan B. P. Norris
    We seem to have nothing, yet we possess everything
    in nomine …

    I spent a good part of yesterday thinking, “This is a very inconvenient time to be having Ash Wednesday!”
    There are half a dozen genuinely important things that I really should have doing, - (like getting the third floor Christmas decorations stashed away)
    In fact, pancakes and mid-week sermons really did not rank very high on my to-do list yesterday afternoon.
    I was way too distracted and busy to think about repenting at that moment.

    Or - - - was my busy-ness feeling precisely pointing toward the importance
    of my celebrating Ash Wednesday?

    So I reconsidered this “busy-ness thing.”
    When I was thinking, a week ago, about Ash Wednesday,
    I was caught, by a sentence in a meditation from Tom Ehrich.
    It said, “As Jesus tried to tell people, it is fundamentally necessary to share what we have with others,
    to the point of not having enough,
    for then God can provide.”

    “It is fundamentally necessary to share what we have with others, to the point of not having enough, for then God can provide.”
    It’s pretty clear is that “not having enough” things to do is not now, and was not yesterday my life situation.
    I pretty clearly had and have “way too much.”
    too much busyness,
    too much stuff to do,
    too much time claiming activity, etc.
    The end result of this “more than enough to do”
    was that there is often no room for God’s presence –
    or God’s action - anywhere in the picture.

    And what use is a priest –
    what use is any Christian – without room for God’s action and presence in our lives?

    The first thing Lent’s call to repent was about for me was to give away a bunch of importance and busy-ness so as
    to leave some room for God in my life.

    I believe this fundamental necessity of giving away what we have to the point of not having enough, for then God can provide tells us something important about our lives and about Lent?

    It tells us that a full house is just that – full.
    But God asks for room.
    A full life is just that – but God asks for time and attention.
    A full purse is just that – but God demands that we give away our wealth so that She can give us greater wealth.

    Perhaps for many of us, what we need to give up during Lent Is not chocolate, or movies, or money
    Perhaps we need to give up being too busy, or having too much money.
    We could lay aside being too needed, too important, too essential to running the world.
    We could quit worrying, scurrying, & hurrying.
    Perhaps Lent could be a time to focus on clearing out a space
    in our lives for God,
    and then finding out what God wants us to do with that space.
    Maybe – shocking thought – God just wants it to be empty
    so that she can visit now and then.
    Or maybe she wants it cleared out to permanently lighten our “worry and responsibility” load.

    It is hard for responsible grown-ups to let go of our lives even a little. We feel permanently responsible for “everything.”
    Our human attempts to control our lives and the world grow crazier and more frantic each year.
    Yet we keep trying to “do better” – by which we mean “control more” -
    and yelling at ourselves when life and the world fail to bend to our ideas of how they or we should be.

    My kid doesn’t like or do well in math – find a tutor – call the teacher,
    scold the child, object to the curriculum, but don’t say,
    “Oh dear, math is not really your best thing is it?
    Let’s help you find something that is right for you.

    Can’t get that job for which you keep angling? Beat up on yourself,
    bitch about the boss or the management.
    but don’t think – whoops, maybe I should look elsewhere; or consider doing something else.
    GraSP has a small deficit budget?
    Suppose we stop spending our time worrying, and simply handle the money we have carefully and faithfully. We might also notice that God has always provided enough money for our budget year after year,
    so perhaps as long as we give away all we should, God will keep on providing the monies we actually need for our mission.

    Deficit budgets, whether of money, or time, or talent, remind us that we alone can’t control any problematic situation
    only God can do that.
    And God can only enter our lives if there is space for Her.
    So this Ash Wednesday, let’s look at our lives,
    the full and the empty, the good and the bad,
    And then lets
    “give it up, give it away, loose it, stop holding onto it,”
    whatever it takes to clear out spaces in our lives for the power and presence of God.

    Let’s declare a fast from hurrying, scurrying,
    being worried and afraid,
    planning and plotting, and
    controlling everything.

    And let us remember the words of St. Paul,
    “that we are said to be dying, yet we are alive,
    sorrowful, though we are always rejoicing;
    poor, yet we enrich many. When we seem to have nothing, then we possess everything!

    Thanks be to God!


    For past week's readings and sermons, please the archive of sermons