Ash Wednesday
Silence and introspection are absolutely vital for us. We often read of Jesus going off to be alone and to pray. The Church recognizes the importance of silence for reflection. At the very least, we have a few seconds between the readings and after the sermon to ponder the word that we have just heard. That time for silence should also be part of our daily lives when we read our bibles and think about what we have just read; it should be part of our lives as we daily examine our heart, life, conscience in light of the holy Ten Commandments to recognize and repent of our sins. This importance of silence and reflection is so vital that the Church gives us two seasons of the Church Year in which silence, introspection, prayer, and contemplation are key parts. The first is Advent—a time in which we ponder the coming of our Lord and prepare our hearts for the celebration of His coming at Christmas. The other season is the one we are entering today—the season of Lent. Of the two, Lent, by far, is the most quiet and penitential. With Advent, we find times for quiet and reflection hard to come by with all the commotion of Christmas. But Lent is different. It comes for us in the quiet time of late winter and early spring when there is really nothing tugging at us for our attention. It will do us well to make full use of the Lenten season that lies before us; for our spiritual good may we find time for silence and reflection.
One of the key parts of our time of silence and meditation before the Lord as we think about who and what He is and does and who and what we are is humility. We approach the Lord in humility. And that’s the theme we really find in Lent—that call recognize our sins and so to approach the Lord in humility as broken and crushed sinners. Our time of silence and contemplation before the word of God is used wrongly and is a lie if at the end we say the same thing as the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable [Lk. 18.11]: God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. Our text today that the Holy Spirit has written by St. James is really ten commands to root out sinful pride. As we hear Lent’s call to repent, let us use this season to truly examine our conscience and so say to the Lord from our heart, “I, a poor miserable sinner …deserve Your temporal and eternal punishment.”
And here is the amazing thing in our time of quiet reflection this Lent—Lent has a two-pronged emphasis. First is the call to repent, our examination of heart and life in the light of God’s law where we will recognize our sin and, taking them seriously, repent of them. The second is on the suffering of Jesus for those sins. That suffering of Jesus is what we will focus on during our Wednesday evening services. There we see the depth of His love for us and all that He did/ had to do to save us from our sin—and which He did to bring us forgiveness of sins and reconcile us to God and so open heaven to us!
These two–confession and the work of Christ– belong together because what would be the point of recognizing and confessing our sins if God were not merciful to us in Jesus and forgiving us our sins; if we could not go to the Lord in confession with the glorious certainty of forgiveness of that sin in Jesus? In our time of Lenten silence and reflection let us recognize both our sin and our Lord’s grace to us grounded in the work of Jesus—His life, suffering and death for us. In other words, Lent is a time for us to be humbled and raised up! Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.
The first thing that St. James writes in our text is: Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Here we are brought to the center of our Christian lives—that battle against the devil and his attacks and temptations. In Sunday’s Gospel we will see Jesus engaged in this battle against the devil and his temptations and winning—for us! The thing to remember is that the devil is real and so are the demons. We should be seized with horror and dread whenever we read/ are reminded of the devil. We must be aware that his gaze is directed at us to destroy us and our faith. We must be aware that our old sinful self that we all still have, even though we are Christians, stands in his service; we must be aware that it isn’t for nothing that Jesus calls the devil the ruler of this world [Jn 12.31] and that his minions, the demons, are arrayed against us—and, again, even within us he has an ally with our old sinful nature. So, yes, we must be engaged in ceaseless vigilance and a tireless battle, a battle for our eternal salvation.
And what does St. James say here? – Resist the devil and he will flee from you. But how do we resist/ oppose the devil? By doing what the apostle writes in the first part of the verse—Therefore submit to God. Submitting to God—that’s the remedy for getting rid of Satan and his influence in our lives! And what’s submitting? It’s humbling ourselves before the Lord; it is obedient humility/ humble obedience. All of our sin has its root in the pride of the human heart that refuses to bow to the Lord’s will; we want to do our own thing—that’s our old sinful nature that wants to follow the ways and temptations from the devil. We/ our desires become the center of our lives. But when we humble ourselves and fight against our own sinful desires, when by the power of the Holy Spirit we resist the devil’s temptations and place God’s will/ desires above our own sinful will then we are submitting to God. In other words—by submitting to God we are resisting the devil.
As we humble ourselves before the Lord, we are filled with Godly sorrow. That’s why the quiet of Lent is so valuable—it allows us time to examine our conscience; that’s why a bit of time each day—maybe at night reflecting on the day just past—holding our life up to the mirror of God’s holy Law and seeing our sin and also where we have followed the will of God—is so vital. As we recognize our sin, we humble ourselves by not trying to excuse or explain away our sins; we let God’s holy law condemn us, as St. James writes in our text: Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. As we recognize our sin, we see that we have turned from the Lord and have become guilty; so, of course, as Christians that will bring forth this mourning and weeping in us! As we recognize our sin, how can we not want to turn away from it? When we recognize our sin, how miserable we feel because we see that we are in that sin and fallen state. The first thing we Christians want to do when we realize our sin is to repent of it. There is nothing more vital for us. That’s why the apostle writes: Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. When we come face to face with the realization of our sin, we never laugh off God’s call to mourn for sin. Where there before was joy in what we thought were the delights of sin, there is now gloom and dejection.
And this confession—this lamenting, mourning and weeping—is our humbling ourselves before God; it is a Godly sorrow. God’s holy Law has shown us our sin and condemned us. But it doesn’t stop there! This lamenting, mourning and weeping is but a prelude to restoration. We cannot receive the forgiveness of sins unless we first recognize our sin. If we think we have no sin or our sin is not a big deal, what need do we have for forgiveness or a Savior from those sins? So yes, in the quiet of Lent let us reflect on the devil’s assault on us our sin and let that humble us so that we turn to the Lord, so that we are driven into our Savior’s loving arms outstretched on the cross for us.
Recognizing that by our sins we have gone against the will of the holy God Himself, the very God who made us and who threatens to punish all who sin against Him, it might seem logical to turn away from God and avoid Him. But that’s what the devil would have us do. He wants to divide/ separate us from God; he wants us to think that there is no hope for us and that God wants nothing to do with us sinners. But what does St. James say here? Draw near to God. Although that’s the very opposite of what we might expect, that is the very thing God wants us to do—to go to Him in humility and repentance. And that very act of going to the Lord in humility and seeking His forgiveness is faith! It is faith that trusts in His promise to forgive us for Jesus’ sake. Although God is not far from us physically, after all in Him we live and move and have our being [AC 17.27,28], we, by our sin and sinfulness are far from Him in our attitudes and thoughts. That’s why we are told here to draw near to Him—approach Him in worship and repentance. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. As we come to God in humility and confession with our sin, what do we have here in our text—Draw near to God? God’s word that He will not drive away those who come to Him! Jesus tells us [Jo. 6.37]: and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. Again, we are humbled so that we can be raised up!
It is God Himself who raises us up. After saying Draw near to God the apostle then adds: and He will draw near to you. As we, recognizing and in sorrow over our sins, humble ourselves and draw near to God, He draws near to us in mercy, forgiving us our sin, freeing us from their guilt and anxiety. He will answer our prayer of repentance and draw near to us with grace and divine blessing. This is how He exalts us and raises us up! Here in church we see this image of us drawing near to God and He drawing near to us so beautifully and clearly. We draw near to God as we come here into His house loaded down with our sins and we approach Him in confession: I, a poor, miserable sinner… And what does God do? He draws near to us as through the pastor He speaks to us the absolution—giving us the forgiveness of our sins. God does not demand that we come to Him already perfect and holy. He wants us to come to Him lowly, humble, weighed down by our sins so that He can forgive them and exalt us/ raise us up!
And do you want to know also something else so amazing and gracious? Our true worship is when we go to the Lord in all humility and lowliness. Because what are we doing? We are taking God at His word and promise; we are saying “amen!”
to it. And that is faith! Faith—that believes and holds to God’s word—is our greatest worship! Our greatest worship of God is when we recognize our sin, sorrow over our sin and go to Him in humble repentance! The holy writer wrote [Eccl 3.20]: By the humble [the Lord] is glorified.
Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. And what is grace upon grace, what else does our Lord do here in church as we come to Him humble in confession and burdened and weighed down by our sin? He comes and in the Blessed Sacrament He gives us the forgiveness of sins—as He does what? As He comes to us in it physically/ bodily giving us with the bread and wine His very body and blood. And so He draws near to us in the most intimate way as He actually unites with us as we receive Him in our mouths. How greatly we are exalted! We come to Him in repentance lowly, burdened and humbled and He comes to us and exalts us, giving us every great heavenly spiritual gift and blessing in Christ. He exalts us as He then forgives us our sin, gives us new life and finally the crown of eternal life.
May we make use of the full use of Lent’s time for silence and reflection, its great blessing—Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up. INJ