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First Sunday in Lent

Genesis 9
8Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying,
9"Now behold, (I)I Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your descendants after you;
10and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.
11"I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall (J)never again be cut off by the water of the flood, (K)neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth."
12God said, "This is (L)the sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all successive generations;
13I set My (M)bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth.

Mark 1
9(H)In those days Jesus (I)came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.
10Immediately coming up out of the water, He saw the heavens opening, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon Him;
11and a voice came out of the heavens: "(J)You are My beloved Son, in You I am well-pleased."
12(K)Immediately the Spirit impelled Him to go out into the wilderness.
13And He was in the wilderness forty days being tempted by (L)Satan; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels were ministering to Him.
14(M)Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, (N)preaching the gospel of God,
15and saying, "(O)The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; (P)repent and believe in the gospel."

Have you given something up for Lent?

We live in a kind of "echo tradition," where the rediscovery of long held Christian traditions is mostly incomplete. After the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century, most of what we now mark as the Christian year went out the window. In the stark Catholic-Protestant divide that has defined the last few centuries, things like Lent were considered "too Catholic" and not worthy of our observation. It's only in the last few decades that we have gradually warmed up to the seasons of the church year and traditions such as a forty-day period of preparation for Good Friday and Easter.

I say "echo tradition" because the specific requirements around Lent that exist in the Roman Catholic tradition are modified and certainly reduced in ours. The triple obligation of prayer, fasting and almsgiving is largely ignored in the United Church and other churches of the Reform tradition, with the exception perhaps of additional study and the occasional person who insists on "giving something up."

The common thread on the topic of "giving up" seems to be things that are pleasurable or things that a bad for you. At least one person suggested they were going to give up Google for Lent, but by day two was really struggling. I wouldn't even consider this, of course, because I'd have very little to say on a Sunday morning. And so, having not given up Google, I give you some of my favourites from bloggers and other internet misfits:

From John Zmirak: Schadenfreude, fox hunting and Conspiracy theories (schadenfreude means taking pleasure in the misfortune of others -- something we should never do outside of yacht racing).

From Joel Achenbach (Washington Post): Angel food cake, Deviled eggs, Demon rum (covering the gamut) and the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue (Braille edition).

At least one person said they were giving up abstinence for Lent--a delightful paradox--and one that I expect describes most of us. Now that scientists tell us that many of the things that were once bad are now good (red wine, chocolate, coffee) it might be a safe bet to give up giving up.

***

Immediately the Spirit impelled Him to go out into the wilderness. And He was in the wilderness forty days being tempted by Satan; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels were ministering to Him.

Mark is a man of few words. Call it the Coles Notes version of Jesus' time of testing. There is no extended dialogue, no competing scripture passages, no challenges or elaborate promises, only the essential details of the story: wilderness, temptation, danger and angels. Not much for the preacher to hang his hat on, unlike the delightful exchange between Jesus and the devil in Matthew 4 and Luke 4. Forever proving the old proverb that "even the devil can quote scripture," the longer versions are rich with sermon possibilities as Jesus and the devil confront each other as "dueling Jewish intellectuals." (Jack Miles)

Left then, as we are, with the condensed version, we are free to free associate and find deeper meaning by looking outside the text. The first and most obvious segue from the text can be found in the words "forty" and "wilderness." In the realm of biblical key words, these two transport us to the wilderness wandering of the Israelites and the forty year period it took them to reach the promised land. Lent, of course, is also forty days (excluding Sundays) and so we are clearly being directed to consider this a shared time of testing and utter dependence on God. Manna, water from a rock, the gift of the Law, all of these things put the focus back on the need for people to turn to God and away from self-reliance. It remains a key Lenten theme.

The other key word is "temptation." It was Anthony the Great, the first of the fourth century desert fathers who said, "without temptations, no-one can be saved." He also said, "expect temptation to your last breath" and "whoever has not experienced temptation cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Clearly this was a big theme for him and his followers, off there in the desert escaping from a world of temptation. They seem so far removed from our experience that it is hard to imagine that they have anything to teach us, but perhaps it is precisely that we have so little in common that their words can make us think. My favourite Anthony saying is also rather Lenten in it's outlook:

Do not trust in your own righteousness, do not worry about the past, but control your tongue and your stomach.

I think this sums up almost every self-help book in the last 50 years. Move over Dr. Phil.

***

Following Anthony's advice to not worry about the past, we are confronted by Genesis 9:

Then God spoke to Noah and to his sons with him, saying, "Now behold, I Myself do establish My covenant with you, and with your descendants after you; and with every living creature that is with you...I establish My covenant with you; and all flesh shall never again be cut off by the water of the flood, neither shall there again be a flood to destroy the earth."

The rainbow is God's promise to never again destroy the earth. Sort of. Well, not really. Take a listen:

God said, "This is the sign of the covenant which I am making between Me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all successive generations; I set My bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a sign of a covenant between Me and the earth. "It shall come about, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow will be seen in the cloud, and I will remember My covenant, which is between Me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and never again shall the water become a flood to destroy all flesh.

God is generously making a unilateral covenant, a unilateral pledge to disarm by setting aside his bow (his weapon) and never again destroy the earth and all it's creatures. The rainbow is not a promise, however, just a reminder. And not even a reminder for us, but rather a divine memo-to-himself to never again destroy the earth. Kind of scary when you think of it in these terms. Why does God need a perpetual reminder that he pledged not to destroy us all?

Jack Miles, author of "God: A Biography" puts all of this into fine relief when he argues that despite the rainbow, God very quickly returns to his menacing ways pre-flood. God begins to threaten destruction again, and even if we ignore this we cannot ignore the sense that we know what this God is capable of. Miles describes God as "not just unpredictable, but dangerously unpredictable." (p. 46)

The antidote to all of this is also found in the scriptures. This is the conclusion of the flood story, found many books later in Isaiah 54:

In an outburst of anger
I hid My face from you for a moment,
But with everlasting lovingkindness
I will have compassion on you,"
Says the LORD your Redeemer.
For this is like the days of Noah to Me,
When I swore that the waters of Noah
Would not flood the earth again;
So I have sworn that I will not be angry with you
Nor will I rebuke you.

This is the real change in the life of God we are looking for. It's not so much that God will set his bow aside and choose not to use it. It is not so much that God will set up an internal memo regarding earth-destroying violence, but that anger will turn to love. This is the true revolution in the heart of God that we lift up. This is more than disarmament: this is peace. And because it is God's peace, it is also filled with justice, because God said, "I will have compassion on you."

This is what I am giving up for Lent: I'm giving up any suggestion that God is to be feared. The decision to not end human life became final when it became a decision to love. The real end to the flood story is God's unending desire to forgive. We live with the constant temptation to fear God, to imagine that God could destroy us and perhaps the whole world, when this is not the case. We need to set aside fear--especially was we relate to God--and accept the love and forgiveness God extends.

The other temptation worth giving up is the temptation to seek God's favour. Here we enter the land of paradox, because earning God's favour seems to precisely be the motivation that leads people to give things up for Lent. If you do it, however, I suggest you do it to "get right with you" rather than to "get right with God." God already loves you and forgives you your chocolate, red wine and excessive amounts of schadenfreude. If you give these things up, do it to improve your life and the life of others. Do it to mend the fabric of your life or your family or your community, but don't do it to earn points with God. Those points have already been won.

In the end, I'm still going to listen to Anthony of the desert:

Do not trust in your own righteousness, do not worry about the past, but control your tongue and your stomach.

Amen.

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 6:11 AM