Ash Wednesday

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0:00 Glad you're here, glad you get to be together. It's fun to have some of us in the room and others that was watching but I'm like I'm feeling it's really good this evening to have you all in the room with us and be able to be together. And we are thinking about your Lenten experience of course, Ash Wednesday today starts this season of Lent where the church for generations

0:31 and generations has said that we need, humanity needs a set aside time of preparation and reflection to be able to fully appreciate and celebrate the resurrection. This is what Lent is for that we would take time to appreciate the need for in order that we might fully appreciate the benefit of Easter. And so

1:03 we set aside this time starting today through Easter to acquaint ourselves with our need for a Savior and particularly what I want to think just a few minutes about this evening is the need for a Savior to go through death. Why do we need a Savior that goes through death? That's what I want to think about a little bit this evening together. And to get us there I want to use the text in Joel

1:35 at dinner the other night Megan was dazzling to me with how she still knew all the Old Testament books that dazzled a pastor I suppose. She still knew all the Old Testament books and could say them in order and I could get through the history books and through maybe the writings but you lose me after the major prophets and she made her way all the way through all the minor prophets which includes Joel. So if you know how in a sword drill to find Joel then Megan

2:07 is a good worthy opponent for you because you could probably still do it. And we print it off before you leave this evening or if you're at home we'll get these out to you in an email or we'll put them on the website but we maybe it's called a table devotions for Lent. Now this is for you to take home and do in your house it's a brief little order where you might think through the words of the hymn greatest I faithfulness and then on the back there's a text for each

2:39 week where you might read the same text before dinner every week together and then a brief series of prayers really brief here that you could read through together and even just the practice of having a different way to prepare for a meal a different pre-dinner meal helped set off the season of Lent to remind you we're doing something different in this time in our relationship to God. We're focusing on our need for a Savior and so the text that's on that sheet for Ash Wednesday is the one I want to look at it's in Joel chapter 2 verse 13

3:12 and Joel like I said it's one of these minor prophets which means he's in a really difficult period for Israel right before the prophetic voice shuts down and he's got in chapter 1 I called a repentance and then here chapter 2 starts with a very kind of terrifying day of the Lord and then verse 12 and 13 is where I want to look verse 12 says yet even now declares the Lord return to

3:46 me with all your heart with fasting and weeping and with mourning and render your hearts and not your garments return to the Lord your God for return to the Lord your God for he is gracious and merciful slow to anger and a bounding in love and he and he relents over disaster return to the Lord your God for he is gracious and merciful slow to anger and a bounding instead fast

4:17 love that's the description of God that I like and actually it's one that I have memorized over my life very easily return to Lord for he is slow to anger gracious and merciful a bounding instead fast love that's lovely what bothers me is the day of the Lord part the rend your heart part the rend your hearts and not your garments come with fasting and weeping and mourning that's the part that bothers me when we be on ash Wednesday when we put ashes on your

4:50 forehead we we say remember that from dust you came and who does your return that's the part that's kind of uncomfortable when you think about Jesus as the Savior he comes to he demonstrates he accomplishes the salvific act through the crucifixion and then buried into the tomb of death and then of course he comes out on Easter but he goes through death first I was

5:23 even thinking about Adam and Eve the first ones today about how they have this like fatal flaw that they pass down to all humanity that we cannot believe God has our best interests at heart that instead of perceiving from God they take from God and and God says I you've demonstrated this flaw that you won't let me be God that humanity you'd rather be God you think you know better than God demonstrated this flaw and God tells him from the very beginning in the garden still before he exiles them I'll fix it but what gets me is that he

5:59 does exile them think about that today removing them from the tree of life puts a flaming sword between humanity and the tree of life says you will not come back in here sentencing Adam and Eve to death that's kind of like a bummer and and and but it's a bummer that I feel like if

6:33 we're going to fully understand Easter even the gospel the good news of Jesus of Nazareth we it we're required to grapple with that bummer why does God this fact out of an Eve from the garden and sentenced them to death why does the prophet Joel say yet even though you need to render garments and not your hearts that you need to weep and mourn yet still a repent and come to the Lord

7:07 your God for his gracious why does it have to be a yet if God's gonna save us why doesn't he have to do it through death and the short answer is there is part of you for which there is no saving there are aspects of me that will never be fixed

7:37 you can't grit your teeth and just decide to be a good person if you have struggle with anger the answer is not to just grit your teeth and determine I will no longer be angry if you struggle with patience the worst thing you can do is yell at yourself inside your head over and over again I must be more patient I must be more patient I'm terrible for my lack of patience if you

8:15 struggle with addiction the answer is not I can beat this on my own just pile more willpower on top of more willpower there are parts of me and you for which there is no saving God the father looking at Adam and Eve in the garden recognize this immediately the part of them that believes that they know better than God that brings about in their life immediately shame guilt fear right this

8:50 part cannot be undone because if there is life for you at all it's on the other side of death it's on the other side of death this is why Jesus goes through the grave and says I am the first fruits I've my death now is yours so that you and I in the season of

9:24 length with ashes on our forehead can come to God heartbroken that we have failed yet again that there is part of us this year as crazy as it has been that has bound us into parts of our life we wish we didn't have to deal with anymore that you and I can come to God recognizing that we are stingier than we'd like to be that we are angrier than is helpful for us then we are more

10:05 lustful than is profitable for us that we are more self-serving than we'd like to be this evening this tonight at Wednesday with ashes on our head and for the rest of the Lenten season we can calmly and mournfully recognize that part of us just needs to die the reason we can do that is because the God of

10:46 creation and life throughout the whole story of the scripture and ever since then has been bringing life out of death so that the way for you to move into the life that you would like is to recognize that your efforts will fail so God can succeed to say Lord I would come to the end of my efforts I cannot fix myself

11:20 but Lord you are gracious and merciful flow to anger and abounding in love I recognize I need you to resurrect what I will let die I need you to bring to life things in me that will live with me forever this is what repentance is and that's what is the opportunity we have in the Lenten season is to recognize that

11:56 God can bring life to us now through our failure actually in our failure when when it's John the Vaxifit says in my weakness he is strong right but that I

12:29 must become less if he must become more this idea that God works best in the places where you are weakest I love the invitation of Joel to believe that God is slow to anger gracious and merciful abounding instead fast love because that allows me to face the parts of me that always will bring destruction in my life

13:04 and if I can face those in this season then God can bring life to me when the time is right so what we're gonna do this evening is give you an opportunity to start down that road and there's lots of ways you might do that we have those prayer journals that we gave out last week there's more here if you didn't get them we just made for this year a little prayer journals for you to take with you and every time you gather you might bring it back and and write down what occurs to you during the worship service maybe what the Holy Spirit's

13:35 revealing to you maybe a prayer tonight maybe a concession maybe an opportunity to agree with God of your need for salvation the parts of you that bring destruction that you want to let die we also put these candles out here it's a place where you might sometimes it's helpful to just light a candle and see that what something that was cold when the flame touches it it can come to life and that might be a prayer for you as you like to candle to think about Lord I am hoping that in this Lenten season you bring joy to life in me you bring

14:08 love to life in me you bring purpose and mission and forgiveness and hope and service you bring things to life in me that might be a place and then of course you can come up and get asked us which the church has done for generations as a reminder as a place to sit in repentance that says without God I have only death and so I look at death now and I do it with God in order that he would bring me life I think that as we repent God is gracious and merciful to

14:41 forgive and restore and enliven and he can do that for us this evening let me pray that he would hey Lord thank you for your steadfast love towards us give us the courage to bet all on your steadfast love to Lord agree that there are parts of us that must just be put to death maybe we can name those this evening

15:13 Silenie and her hearts get them down on paper Lord maybe we can agree with you of our need for life