Listen to the music!
The music, listen to the music!
That’s our joyful closing hymn this Lent morning. Listen to the words:
Now quit your care and anxious fear and worry;
for schemes are vain and fretting brings no gain.
Lent calls to prayer, to trust and dedication;
God brings new beauty nigh; reply, reply,
Reply with love to Love Most High.
To bow the head in sackcloth and in ashes,
Or rend the soul, such grief is not Lent’s goal;
But to be led to where God’s glory flashes,
His beauty to come near.
Make clear, make clear,
Make clear where Truth and Light appear.
We are deep in Lent, where all of a sudden things keep changing, and the world is filled with uncertainty, anxiety, changing day to day, even hour to hour. Over my years, I’ve read so many dystopian stories that I wonder what Nature and Man are up to. But with God it’s always love, it’s a beautiful day, and there’s hope and salvation.
Notwithstanding the uncertainty of these days, I pray you are enjoying Lent, not beating yourself up - - either over your sins, whatever they may be, or because, like me, you have no sense of being a sinful creature in constant need of repentance, penance and absolution in the first place. I’d be “truly sorry and humbly repent” if my sins were tormenting me, but they’re not. In fact, some are lovely memories! And besides, I’ve washed up, we’ve done the Penitential Order, I’m clean and so are you!
We are a religion of stories and uplifting songs, like "Quittez, Pasteurs", our closing hymn. And holy history, Heilsgeschichte, salvation stories,- I’m thinking of stories:
Sunday before last, Adam and Eve in the Garden listen to the serpent instead of God, but hallelujah! God comes and saves. A gospel of that ancient story is that God lovingly created us to be human beings, not household pets, to make our own choices and be responsible for them.
In a “water story”, the ancient Israelites are led through the Red Sea into the wilderness with Moses: today there’s no water, they are thirsty, whining and complaining as usual, but God leads Moses to strike the rock, and water gushes out, hallelujah! God saves!
Today, another “water story”, Jesus with the Samaritan woman at the well. “I AM the living water: whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give shall never thirst; but the water that I give shall be a well of water springing up to everlasting life.” Hallelujah!
I’m thinking of yet another “water story”. We’re not reading it this year, we read it last year, but you know it. There’s a wedding at Cana of Galilee. Jesus is there as an invited guest, with his disciples, and panic! the wine runs out, a disaster for the wedding celebration, humiliation and social ruin for the father of the bride and his family. People will leave in disgust, laugh and gossip about it for years to come, the groom will refuse to go through with the wedding, and the bride’s family’ll be disgraced forever. But hey, look! Over there! Six stone water jars for the rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.
We already know Jesus changes the water into wine, so I’m not going there, I’m about Purification Rites! You were invited to the feast. Upon arriving from your long, hot, dusty journey, you wash up, splash in the water, wash your hands and arms, wash your feet, slosh water over your sweaty face, cool down drenching wet, dry off, and join the celebration, fresh and clean!
Same here: the Penitential Order is not a guilt trip, this is Sunday IN Lent, not OF Lent, it’s a feast day. Like the water jars, the Penitential Order is a rite of purification to wash up as we enter God’s presence and the celebration of true worshipers, worshipping the Father in spirit and in truth.
I love the chuches’ ancient liturgies, the words and phrases are melodious, and flow beautifully. But I appreciate, and love even more, that we are long years downstream - from the church ladening us with sin-guilt that we are evil creatures who keep God in a towering rage. That’s not the nature of our relationship with God, and Lent with Jesus is not about guilt and shame.
A national emergency is proclaimed, but the light of God shines through the clouds, and we are The Jesus People, we celebrate Sunday with each other in the Spirit of God that Presiding Bishop Michael Curry preaches. Jesus is here, even or especially Sundays in Lent, which, as I keep saying, are not Sundays OF Lent, but Sundays IN Lent, not Fast Days but Feasts of our Lord Jesus Christ: today we are excused from the penitential burdens of the Forty Days: did you hear that? Sundays are exempt, not counted in the Forty Days of Lenten Penitence! If you did not know that, know it now. Sundays do not count AS Lent. IN Lent, but not OF Lent, you can have chocolate today! And ice cream. And anyone who says otherwise does not know what they’re talking about.
Six days fast, Sunday feast.
Six days fast, Sunday feast.
Six days fast, Sunday feast.
And though we begin in penitence with confession, our liturgical worship does not to bring us down in sackcloth and ashes.
Now quit your care and anxious fear and worry;
for schemes are vain
and fretting brings no gain.
Lent calls to prayer, to trust and dedication;
God brings new beauty nigh; reply, reply,
Reply with love to Love Most High.
To bow the head in sackcloth and in ashes,
Or rend the soul, such grief is not Lent’s goal;
But to be led to where God’s glory flashes,
His beauty to come near.
Make clear, make clear,
Make clear where Truth and Light appear.
God loves you, and Jesus saves, Hallelujah!
Yes, it’s Lent: Hallelujah anyway! Hallelujah!
Let’s stand and say the Creed!
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Sermon preached on the 3rd Sunday IN Lent by the Rev Tom Weller. Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, Panama City, Florida. 15 March 2020.
Texts: Revised Standard Lectionary propers for Lent3A.
Dawning beyond Watson Bayou and Millville, 6:42 AM, Sunday, May 15, 2020
Waning moon over StAndrewsBay, Florida. March 15, 2020, 4:26 AM. 64°F 86% humidity,.