Texts: Joel 2;1-2, 12-17; Psalm 103; 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10; Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
Around this time of the year, late winter, some of us look forward to opening the windows and doing some spring cleaning. One time around the beginning of Lent I had a dream about cleaning a dirty window. We could think about Lent as a season for spiritual housework.
During Lent we have the opportunity to do our own spiritual housework, to consider the condition of our souls. We take the time and the courage to look into all those dirty, dusty little corners of our spiritual house, perhaps to do a little cleaning, or re-organizing, or maybe even throwing out some things. Perhaps we’ll dust off our prayer books and Bibles by opening them, and reading and praying.
This is the day we are reminded that without God we are just dust. These are familiar words from the burial office—“earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” Dust and housecleaning is something with which we are all familiar. We find our beginning and our end in the common stuff of creation—dirt, the ground.
It is only God who gives that common stuff life, he animates it and gives meaning and direction to that life. We find that we are connected to him through our soul—that deepest, most hidden part of our being—the true, essential ‘us’, ‘me’, ‘you’.
Do you ever watch those television shows about hoarders? After they finally agree they have a problem, it seems the biggest challenge they fact next is deciding where, and when, and how to start. Then, deciding what to keep, what to give away, and what to throw away. Some will have a reason to keep almost every single thing—even something as useless as an old American cheese wrapper or a burnt out lightbulb.
We each have something like this inside us just as useless. For us it might be avoiding someone who hurt us a long time ago, holding a mild grudge against them, or refusing to acknowledge that something we did hurt someone else. Or it may be an old voice inside ourselves telling us we are not worthy of love, or rather, that we are indeed special—more important than some, or that we are so good and our intentions are so pure, what do we have to confess? Or it could be our whole worldview to which we cling, while admittedly not being as trivial as an old cheese wrapper, we cling to it because it is ours and it is familiar and it makes complete sense only to us. It’s the same kind of thinking of hoarders.
This may be a good place to start our spiritual housecleaning, on Ash Wednesday, asking God to help us take a fresh look at what is in our souls, what needs to go, and what needs to be put in a better place.
And these are just some of the tools of spiritual housecleaning—prayer and fasting, self-examination, repentance and sacramental confession, being intentional about being quiet and listening to God, doing some good spiritual reading—something that will stretch you, or simply listening to the seasonal sacred music of the Church.
If practiced diligently, Lent can actually be an experience of dying with Christ, so that we might fully experience rising with Him on the Day of the Resurrection, to find a new life with Him this Easter.
The 40 days of Lent parallel Jesus’ 40 days in the desert. Lent puts us in the desert with Jesus, to fast with him, to pray to him, and to be quiet enough to listen to him. When we do, we are closer to God the Father, living life in the gentleness of the Holy Spirit.
You may remember that this is how Jesus was prepared for his earthly ministry—in the desert, alone with God, fasting and praying—not even having the distraction of eating—and being tempted by Satan himself.
Might we also be prepared in the desert of Lent for further ministry to others in Christ’s name?
This season brings us face to face with the fact of God’s son living, serving, denying himself, sacrificing and dying for us. This was how he was prepared to save us.
Some of us are fasting from things we usually enjoy, slowing down, praying more, simplifying our daily lives. When we practice Lent this way together as a church, we encourage each other. It’s the idea behind our Simple Suppers which will begin next Wednesday. Through this season of Lent, if we walk this way with Christ and with one another, we will arrive with Him on his day of triumph over sin and death. What a day that will be, to joyfully celebrate God’s forgiveness, and to deeply appreciate its significance for the life of the whole world. Amen.
