HE WAS JUST TRYING TO GET TO PASSOVER

As the story opens up today from the book of John, Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem to participate in the annual Passover observance. As we journey through Lent toward our participation in Holy Week, we need to understand that our observance of the days around Easter parallel our Jewish brothers and sisters observance of the Feast of Passover. Both holy seasons, Easter and Passover, are closely related in in order for us to really appreciate the events surrounding the crucifixion and resurrection, we need to understand the events surrounding the Passover. For not only was Jesus come to Jerusalem to observe Passover when he was arrested and crucified, the happenings of Passover are an explanation of why Holy Week and the crucifixion happened as they did and why Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross was a necessity in order to restore our relationship to God.
Recorded in the book of Exodus, God said to the Hebrew people regarding Passover - “You shall observe Passover as an ordinance forever.” And the Jews have done this. Since the time of Moses, Jews have set aside the observance of Passover. Their life just stops. There is nothing that takes the place of their families getting together for this important feast. It is amazing that the Jewish people, worldwide still honor this ancient tradition and it truly takes precedence of anything else - Jewish businesses will close, Jewish children and youth are excused from school - there is no participation in sports or anything else that might be going on during this time of Passover. Unlike our Christian practices where the things of the church are considered optional if there is something else happening, for the Jews of long ago and of the present, there is nothing that will take them away from this sacred time.
Amazing as well, is that the ritual of Passover has not changed from the time it was instituted by God during the Hebrew escape from Egypt. We often complain because things are routine, about doing things the same way, of hearing the same stories over and over - we want to shake things up and try to do it new ways - but the Passover ritual is exactly as it was when God instituted in over 4000 years ago. God said, “This is how you are going to do it” and this is how it is done ever since.
To celebrate Passover, the family gathers for the traditional seder meal and the meal begins with the head of the family asking the question, “What makes this night different from all other nights?” The younger members of the family then recite the story of the first Passover and the story of the Exodus.
Now to review for ourselves what this story is: God’s people have been in slavery in Egypt for over 400 years. They cry out to God for a savior to free them from this bondage and God sends them Moses. Moses’ job is to free the Hebrews from slavery and get them out of Egypt so they could travel to the land God has promised them - the Promised Land. It isn’t an easy job as Pharaoh didn’t want to lose this free labor source he had. Pharaoh was constructing storage buildings and needed cheap labor to get them all built, so Pharaoh wasn’t going to let of of these Hebrews very easily. So time after time Moses come to Pharaoh, asks Pharaoh to let the Hebrew people leave Egypt, Pharaoh says “No!” and God sends some kind of great disaster to the Egyptian People. And remember for the most part the plagues only affected the Egyptians, not the Hebrews. And realistically, Pharaoh was insulated in his palace and he had enough of his ‘people’ around him that the plagues never really affected Pharaoh that much. Until the last one. There had been 9 plagues, Pharaoh would not let the people leave, and so Moses goes to the Hebrew people with some instructions. they’re to find a lamb without blemish, 1 year old; they were to slaughter it, collect the blood and roast the meat which was to be eaten with bitter herbs and unleavened bread. They were to eat it in haste while they were getting ready to pack to leave Egypt. The blood was to be spread on the outside of their doors and that night, when the angel of death passed through the land, it would ‘pass over’ any door that was smeared with lambs blood. Otherwise, the first born, animal or human, would die.
This plague did affect Pharaoh - his first born son died and so he finally let the people go. This is the central act of salvation recorded in the Old Testament and it is mentioned in just about every book of the Bible. Even Jesus talks about the importance of this observance of Passover and still today jews all around the world stop everything they are doing to remember and participate in the ritual of Passover.
The Passover ritual today is very similar to that first night, however a couple of elements were added after the Hebrews received the instructions from God at Mt. Sinai. The purpose of Passover and these extra practices were to remind the Jews of the history of their being freed from bondage. The use of Salt water to remember the their tears, an egg to remind them of their new life after leaving Egypt. There are a few more added practices but more than we can really address right now - but every part of the Passover has the purpose of reminding the Jews of the salvation God gave them when he freed them from their slavery and guided them through the desert to the Promised Land. God knows that the only way his people will never forget what happened is if they have something they have to do that continually reminds them of what God has done for them. God establishes this repetitive ritual that was to be done forever to remind the Jewish people of what bound them together as God’s people. It was this act of saving them from slavery that sent them on their journey together as this people of God. They were God’s people not only because they were descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but also because as a people God saved them.
Passover also gave the Jewish people an opportunity to stop their lives for an evening, and thank God for this saving act. These 4000 years later they still stop to remember and to thank God and to remind themselves they are the saved people of God.
And this is what Jesus is going to do as our story opens in the book of John. By the time the Hebrew people had settled in the promised land and the temple was built, instead of observing Passover in their own homes, all Jews would travel to Jerusalem to observe Passover together as one people of God. At this time in history, Jews lived all over the world and this coming together for passover was quite a trip for many Jewish families. Think about what it is like in your own life traveling long distances - especially if you have young children. So as hard as that is, imagine what it would have been like to travel very long distances, walking or riding on a donkey, or pulling a wooden cart, over roads that were dirty and dusty and often with children or the elderly. And to do Passover right, you would have had to bring with you a live sacrificial lamb that you had to be certain didn’t receive any blemishes on the journey. Because if the lamb was damaged in any way, you could’t use it for the Seder meal.
So as we humans tend to do, we find a way to make something ‘easier’ on people - missing the whole people that it is not supposed to be ‘easy’ and not being ‘easy’ is the whole point. Many of the things we do as a church as part of our rituals are not suppose to be easy or comfortable as God wants us to understand the concept of sacrifice as his people, of having to put out extra effort to do things he has directed us to do. We need to really examine things when we start say to say, “Well, it would be easier to do it this way…….”
So in order to make bringing the necessary components of the Seder meal easier for those who were traveling, the temple leaders had developed this system to help people get together all the things they needed for the Seder meal without having to transport everything long distances. And we probably see nothing wrong with that - sounds good to us. We’re all for easy and convenient and anything that helps me remember what I am supposed to do instead of putting out effort on my part…. But then we miss the point.
And to compound things, when we humans are trying to make things easier for people, we quickly find a way to make a profit on making things convenient. Nothing new under the sun - ‘how many times have we said “I’d rather pay someone to do whatever than do it myself’. Same things 2000 years ago. But these people who began selling Seder supplies were overdoing it. The convenience of buying a sacrificial lamb without blemish could cost up to a year’s wages, Other items for Passover would cost an enormous amount and you could only use ‘temple’ money to buy the Seder supply - which means you would have to convert your money to temple money - at a fee of course. So this observance of Passover which God had intended to be a simple ritual of remembrance and thanksgiving and gathering together as God’s people had become an expensive hassle - and you had to do it because God said so.
So Jesus travels to Jerusalem to observe Passover, which he as done his whole life. He enters the temple and sees how God’s instruction of this ‘ordinance to be observed forever’ had been distorted and corrupted and made ‘convenient’ - and Jesus goes ballistic and gets a whip and begins to knock over tables and using the whip runs the commerce out of the temple. He was angry about the excess of what these people charged; he was angry that this commerce had entered the sacred space of the temple, and he was angry at the people of God who were participating in this commerce and had substituted convenience for the intended observance of this special time of the year.
This was just another reason the Jewish leaders felt it necessary to get rid of Jesus - because it was the Jewish leaders who were profiting from all these passover sales in the temple. And later in the week we see Jesus and his disciples gathered together for the Seder meal at what we refer to as ‘the Last Supper’ on Maundy Thursday. And it is here that Jesus explains how he will become the Passover Lamb whose blood will be shed for the salvation of God’s people.
Being a follower of God is not convenient. It is not easy. We have this special time of Lent to consider this for our own lives. What are the things of God that we neglect because it isn’t convenient; what are the responsibilities of the church we neglect because it is not convenient.
We are in a very special part of the church year - and God is asking us to remember - to remember what he has done for us; to remember what it has cost him to offer us our salvation and God is challenging us to remain faithful and dedicated - even if it isn’t easy or convenient.

Amen.

SNAKES!

If you enjoy scary movies or science fiction, the story we read from the book of Numbers today will certainly appeal to you. If you like those programs about some type of reptile becoming numerous and taking over, or if you like those animal planet shows about strange animals around the world, this story is for you! This Old Testament narrative is another example of how you can find all types of incredible and strange occurrences in the Bible.
The story opens up as we hear another account about the Hebrew people on their journey across the wilderness on their way to the promised land. Their journey lasts 40 years and this story takes place during the latter part of the journey. Up to this point we remember that God has taken care of these people every step of the way. They have had to provide nothing for themselves. They have been given food, water, a means to worship, the Law to govern them. They have shelter, clothing, shoes, protection. They have a guide to show them the way and solve their problems. They lacked for nothing. But three days into the journey they started complaining. The food wasn't there fast enough. The water wasn't there immediately when they were thirsty. It was like they had no memory at all. When they were reminded of what God had done for them it didn't seem to matter. "Yes God has provided food and water for the last 25 years, but will he do it today?". Not only would they complain that God wasn't giving them food right away, but they would then say that their life had been better when they were in slavery in Egypt. Imagine how hurtful that was for God who had done so much for them and loved them so much. After all, it was because they cried out to God to save them that God responded and freed from the hard life they were living as slaves to the Egyptians. Now that they had what they wanted, they claimed it wasn’t really what they wanted after all.
When our story opens up, the Hebrews are still complaining. What would you do if you had poured your heart and soul into caring for someone, had done everything for them, had essentially made their life simple and easy, and all you heard back for 25 or so years was complaining. God has been pretty tolerant don't you think. No gratitude for all he has done, just one complaint after another. Now they are complaining because they want different food. They are tired of manna and quail. They want something different. And they go into the familiar 'We were better off in Egypt. Sure we don't have to do a thing to get this food except pick it up off the ground - but we were better off in Egypt as slaves working ourselves to death.....'. Well, God finally reached his breaking point.
Did you ever say to your kids - "if you don't stop whining, I'm going to give you something to whine about?" I admit I did and I usually followed through by making them do a chore. That is exactly what God does here. "if you guys are going to whine and say these nasty things, here is something to really whine about". And he sends them snakes - lots and lots of snakes.
When people are polled about the things they are frightened of, snakes always come up as the #1 thing people are afraid of - so imagine snakes everywhere. Whenever you walked outside your tent, snakes. When you went to get your manna in the morning, snakes. When you went to get the water, snakes. Everywhere snakes. Now these were a certain type of snakes called 'fire' snakes. Fire snakes are little black snakes with red markings that looked like flames. Their name also represents the redness and swelling that occurs when they bite. These snakes are small, a few inches long and they jumped. Think about what they Hebrews wore? Sandals and robes - lots of exposed skin. So these little snakes would jump and attach to bare skin and inject their venom. The venom would at the very least make the person very ill and quite possibly be fatal. The Hebrews would go out of their tent to pick up their manna, and there would be these snakes jumping at them, go out to get their water, more snakes. Jumping biting snakes everywhere. The Hebrews run to Moses and say "Moses. Do something!". Moses goes to God and asks God to 'do something'. What would you expect God to do? Getting rid of the snakes would make sense right? But God as usual has other ideas. God's plans was this: He told Moses to get a pole, make a bronze likeness of these fiery little snakes and put it on top of the pole and then make sure the pole was somewhere everyone could see it. Moses was then to instruct the people that whenever they were bit by the snakes, if they look up at the pole, they would be healed, 'saved' from the harmful effects of the snake bite. Nothing difficult. Bit by a snake, look at the pole and everything would be OK. Isn't it interesting that God didn't just get rid of the snakes; that he left the snakes there but gave the people a way to be healed. Didn't take much effort, all they had to do was look up and they would be saved from the effects of the poison. Even though they had a way out, they still had to contend with the snakes.
Years later as Jesus is trying to explain to Nicodemas what salvation is all about, he refers back to this story. Nicodemas is a member of the Sanhedrin – the council that oversaw all the lives of the Jews. The Sanhedrin was made up of prominent citizens and religious leaders. It was the Sanhedrin who was so upset with Jesus who was questioning the ‘way things had always been done’. They didn’t like this ‘new stuff’ that Jesus was teaching. It was the Sanhedrin who tried to keep thinking up ways to get rid of Jesus and it was the Sanhedrin who would eventually arrest and try Jesus and send him to Pilate to be crucified. Nicodemas was a member of this group. But some of the things that Jesus had said resonated with Nicodemas and he wanted to know more. Nicodemas had witnessed the miracles Jesus had performed and he knew that the only way that Jesus could be saying what he was saying and doing what he was doing was if he was of God. Nicodemas as a Jew has been taught his whole life that it was being a descendent of Abraham and living by the Law that produced a relationship with God. Nicodemas had been taught as he went through school the same thing – it was being descendent from Abraham and following the law that you were child of God and as a teacher that is now what he taught. But Jesus was saying something entirely different. So Nicodemas arranged to meet with Jesus to learn more about what this all meant. Jesus tries to explain to Nicodemas that it was not Abraham or following the law that mattered, but letting God change your heart that mattered. That transformation was what was important – allowing God’s spirit to come into your life and transform you into who God knows you can be as his child – as a part of his Kingdom.
“I don’t understand this?” Nicodemas says. “I thought it was not becoming new, but staying with the way we have been living since we received the law that was important. I thought it was just the opposite. Staying as we were that was important. But you are saying we need to change, be made new, let God transform us? I don’t understand.” So Jesus replies, “Remember that story in the Bible about the snakes? Remember how God has Moses lift up that pole and it was looking at the pole that saved the people? That is what is going to happen. Just like that snake was lifted up and used to save the people from the snake bites, I am going to be lifted up and it is by looking to me that people will be brought into a relationship with God.” Jesus explains that just as the Hebrews got their life back when they looked at the snake on the pole, people would get eternal life when they looked at him lifted up on the cross.
We all have the equivalent of little fiery snakes jumping at us in our life. Think about the all the things that cause you pain, that cause you sadness, that cause you difficulty, all those things that hurt you. Think about all those things that just make your life other than that paradise you wish it would be. Wouldn’t it be great if God would just make it all go away. If God would just right now wipe away all our tears, take away all our pain, take away all the aggravations that we have to live with every day. But just like he didn’t take away those snakes, he doesn’t make our life right now a paradise. What he does give us is his son, his son lifted up on a cross, his son who will die for us, will rise for us, will ascend into heaven for us. God gives us his son lifted up on a cross and promises us if we will just look to him, if we will just put our trust in him, we will be transformed, we will receive healing and peace; we will receive the promise that there will be a day with no more tears or pain or aggravations. All we have to do is be willing to look to the cross.

Amen.

40 Days

This morning we read two familiar scripture passages, one as the opening passage and the other during our normal scripture reading, which at first glance don’t seem to have very much to do with each other. The only real obvious tie between these two scriptures is the number 40 - which we talked about last week corresponds not only to many stories in the Bible but also to this season of Lent. Today we are going to look at these 2 stories and see how they work together so we can understand the message God has for us by giving us these stories. We are also going to look at how these stories are relevant to our practice of Lent as we continue through this season of our church year.
The first story we read is the story of Noah from the Old Testament. Most of us remember the story of Noah and the ark. Usually we get stuck with the ‘cute animals two by two’ part of the story but there is so much more there. First we need to remember that Noah was just a normal man - a person just like us, going through his day to day life, working, caring for his family. Then God says ‘the whole rest of the world was depraved’. Now, I know we live in a time now when we look at the situation in the world and we see how bad it is and maybe we think there hasn’t been a time darker then this….. but our problems today aren’t even close to comparing with what the world was like in the time of Noah. First of all look at all the churches around us and think about how many people are in worship this morning all around the world. In Noah’s time there would only have been one family here - only one family in any church. Scripture says there was only one faithful family in the entire world. Imagine that……
Now, God was happy that at least Noah’s family was being faithful to him but he was very angry and depressed because the people he had created and provided for and cared for had forgotten him. So what we see from this story is not so much that people are openly defiant to God, they just quit caring about God and thought he was irrelevant - which led to immorality because people didn’t care about how God had directed them to live. God comments that he wished he had never made these people and how sad is that.
And again, it wasn’t so much the lifestyle God was upset about - it was the fact that people were just totally ignoring him - and we can all probably relate to how much it hurts just to have someone we care about ignore us and make us feel irrelevant.
But somehow in the midst of all this rejection and immorality, there was Noah and his family who still believed in an almighty God and lived accordingly. This couldn’t have been an easy thing. Usually what happens is when someone is surrounded by the unfaithful, they gradually move in that direction. Our sinful nature gravitates toward life without God because let’s be honest, life without God is easier than striving to live each day faithfully as God wants us to live. Those around us who don’t believe can easily draw us away from our faith, our beliefs.
I know everyone of us thinks that this will never happen to us. We have been faithful members of the church most of our lives but I think back on my college days. I grew up in a small town of about 2000 people and I’ll be honest I don’t think I ever knew anyone who didn’t go to church. Growing up in church was very important to me. And then I went to college. What an eye opener that was. There was a Presbyterian Church at the gates that went into the college and it was an easy walk to go there…. and I think I went two Sundays when I realized I was the only one going and everyone else was sleeping in or going somewhere for the day to relax and have fun and people kept inviting me to do things with them and before long you know what happened…..
No matter when it is in history, it is so much easier to follow the crowd than to stand by yourself for what you know is right. And then there is Noah - a man of very strong faith and very strong conviction to be able to live in a time in history when he was the only one in the entire world who was able to stand firm and not have his life misdirected by those around him. How difficult it must have been for him - and for his wife and children who were probably ridiculed. How hard is it for kids in school now a days to have Christian convictions or for you in your work place? How easy is it to get caught up in our own little world - in the things we think are so important and God keeps getting shoved back just a little bit farther. Sure we go to worship on Sunday morning, but that is only an hour and it keeps God in our lives, but by Monday morning we are caught up in our work and our life once again God just isn’t there.
So God tells Noah he is going to destroy everyone on the earth and Noah is to build an ark to save his family and Noah does it. That in itself is pretty remarkable. Noah didn’t live near the sea. There would be no way he could get this giant boat from his house to the seas. For those of you who watch NCIS, remember Gibbs building a boat in his basement and everyone who went down to the basement would ask - “How are you going to get this boat out of here?” How many people walked by and asked Noah what he was doing and I often wondered what Noah said. Certainly he didn’t say ‘God is going to flood the earth and kill everyone’ and if he did, obviously no one believed him.
But whatever Noah said, we know that God gave Noah the blueprints to build the boat and Noah worked on it for 120 years….. again a reminder that God doesn’t always work very quickly and we need to be patient.
The ark was done and in an interesting choice of words we read - God told Noah and his family and the animals to get into the ark, and then God shut him in. Think about that. Noah didn’t close the door and lock it, the Hebrew words used means that the door was ‘sealed’ meaning Noah couldn’t have gotten out even if he wanted to. I’ve often wondered if God shut Noah in so that the people who are drowning outside the boat couldn’t in some way get the door open to get in - or because Noah and his family would hear the cries and the screams from the dying people and feel sorry for them and open the door to let people come in with him?
But the Bible is very clear. The door was sealed and there was no way in and no way out.
We sometimes forget about the tragedy of this story. Real people in a real situation - those on the outside realizing what they had done wrong and knowing it was too late; Noah on the inside wondering and confused and thankful because he had been chosen to be saved.
Then God told Noah that Noah hadn’t been saved just to float around on a boat for 40 days - but that when the boat landed Noah was to repopulate the earth and even more important, Noah was to keep God in the hearts and the minds of the people for as long as he lived. What an overwhelming responsibility. So think about Noah and his family for these 40 days, shut up in the boat and not much else to do but to think about what God had told them they were going to have to do…… So what these 40 days in the ark became, was a time of preparation. A time for Noah and his family to meditate on what had happened and to ready themselves for the job ahead of them - to replenish the earth and to teach God’s principles.
At the conclusion of the flood and on Noah’s departure form the ark, the very first thing Noah and his family did was build an altar and worship God. Now for Noah, worshipping God would have meant offering a sacrifice of one of the animals on board the ark - and by the way scripture does tell Noah to not only put a male and female of every animal on the ark but to put extra of the sacrificial animals so that Noah would have something to sacrifice. So the animal is sacrificed, the prayers were said and now Noah begins this monumental task - to keep God at the forefront of everyone’s lives.
Now let us jump ahead to the life of Jesus in the New Testament. During Lent we usually talk about the 40 day period in Jesus’ life immediately after his baptism when he goes out into the desert for 40 days to consider what he was about to do. Remember as Jesus was baptized, God’s voice was heard saying, “This is my son” and the dove descended to fill him with the Holy Spirit. Remember it was a dove as well that Noah sent out to see if the waters had receded enough to get out of the ark and begin his new life.
So Jesus goes out into the desert filled with God’s spirit to spend 40 days contemplating what his life is going to be like now - to contemplate this overwhelming mission God has given him - just like Noah. Jesus fasted and prayed for 40 days. Just like Noah, a time period to ready himself for his ministry on earth. Just like Noah, God gave Jesus these 40 days to meditate, to study scripture, to cleanse himself of the the ‘ways of the world’ and to focus on the things of God. At the end of the 40 days, we see Jesus tempted by Satan and Jesus ‘passed the test’ if you will. He was able to stand up to the temptations - scripture says these temptations represent ‘all the temptations that are common to people’. Now Jesus is ready to go to work just like Noah….
So you see how these stories fit together. Bot are stories of God leading people into responsibility and of God giving them time to think and prepare - to ready themselves for what God was to have them do.
And so here we are. In this season of Lent - these 40 days God gives us to take time just like Jesus and just like Noah - to contemplate the presence of God in our lives. To think about what God is calling you do to, because I assure you God is calling you to do work for his Kingdom. This Lent is some time for silence - so that God can talk to you; God can fill you with his spirit; God can renew you and fortify you so that when Lent is over and we experience once again the new birth that comes with Jesus resurrection, we are ready to set out on our new adventure in service to our God and his church.

Amen!

LENT: SPRING CLEANING FOR THE SOUL

This is the first Sunday of Lent. Lent is one of the two most important seasons of our church calendar - the other season being Advent. We are probably more familiar with Advent because as a church we have so many things that we do that are associated with that time of the year. We have Advent wreaths and advent candles and advent calendars to count down to Christmas. We have our favorite Christmas Carols we love to sing during that time of year. Advent and Christmas are just joyful times and we like joyful times.
Lent, however, has far fewer church wide events and rituals. Many of us think of Lent as simply that time when Catholics don’t eat meat on Friday or we are asked to give something up. But Lent is so much more than that. Lent should be a very important season for all of us. It is a time for us to look at our lives and re-evaluate ourselves; to look at how we stand in our relationship with God; to think about what it really means to be a follower of Christ. And none of these activities are a whole lot of fun - there isn’t any real joy in spending time being real with ourselves as most of us realize how really far from the mark we have gotten. How we are really not living up to the potential God has put within us; how there is so much more we could be doing to live out Christ’s call to care for others.
This morning, we are going to look at a little of the history behind this season of the year. I think it is helpful for us to understand where Lent came from and why it has become a significant time in our life as a Christian and the life of the church and perhaps by better understanding the reasoning behind Lent we are more apt to adopt it as a practice in our own lives.
First of all, understand that Lent is not a Biblical concept. There is no where in scripture where Lent is mentioned and there is no edict from God for us to participate in it. However, special seasons of the year, special celebrations and Holy Days are a Biblical practice. In the Old Testament God institutes several festival seasons; special seasons for fasting and prayer; feast days and Holy Days. We read on many occasions in the New Testament account of Jesus’ life he was very steadfast in honoring these special times. So the idea behind Lent is very Biblical.
Our understanding of Lent began with the first century Christians. During the first century, it was very dangerous to be a Christian. During this time in history, the Christians were being fed to the lions and suffering all manner of torture and horrible deaths. So anything having to do with the practice of Christianity was kept secret. Lent was instituted back then as a period of time between Maundy Thursday and Easter where new converts to Christianity were taught about the faith. It was generally an instructional time for new members and Easter Sunday was actually known as New Member Sunday.
Much of what was taught during these three days was not so much history or stories of Jesus, but the reality of what life was like as a Christian during this part of history. The new convert was asked if they really wanted to enter into the hardship of following Jesus - with the possibility of losing their job, of being tortured, of their family being tortured or imprisoned or killed, of the possibility of dying a horrible death. And after this intense time of self-reflection and prayer, if the convert decided they wanted to continue as a believer and join the church, they were brought in as members on Easter Sunday during a service, usually at sunrise, somewhere hidden so that the Romans wouldn’t find out what was going on.
As time passed, several centuries later, Lent was expanded to include all of Holy Week - Palm Sunday until Easter - and it was still used as an instructional period. Only now, this week long Lenten period included all the current members of the church. They were called on to ‘pray continually’ all week for those considering membership in the church. It still wasn’t an easy decision to take on this roll as a follower of Christ and the new believer would really need to consider what it meant. After all, Jesus says to everyone to ‘consider the cost’ of what it means to be a follower before committing their lives to living as Jesus truly wants us to live.


Dietrich Bonhoeffer is considered to be one of the greatest theologians of the 20th century. He was a Lutheran pastor during the time of nazi Germany. It is a little reported fact that Hitler actually took over the German Lutheran church and dictated much of what was taught in the church during that period of time and the shame of it was the people just let him do it. Bonhoeffer and a few other Lutheran pastors fought against this interference of the state in the church and eventually Bonhoeffer was imprisoned and killed for his resistance. But during his life, he wrote extensively about what it meant to be a true Christian. His book, The Cost of Discipleship, is a classic and perhaps ought to be mandatory reading for all Christians. One of the most quoted parts of the book deals with the distinction which Bonhoeffer makes between "cheap" and "costly" grace. According to Bonhoeffer, cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.
Cheap grace, Bonhoeffer says, is to hear the gospel preached as follows: "Of course you have sinned, but now everything is forgiven, so you can stay as you are and enjoy the consolations of forgiveness." The main defect of such a proclamation is that it contains no demand for discipleship. In contrast to costly grace, costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. It is costly because it compels a person to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: "My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Bonhoeffer argues that as Christianity spread, the Church became more "secularised", accommodating the demands of obedience to Jesus to the requirements of society. In this way, "the world was Christianised, and grace became its common property." But the hazard of this was that the gospel was cheapened, and obedience to the living Christ was gradually lost beneath formula and ritual. Bonhoeffer argued that if following Christ didn’t cost you anything, then it wasn’t worth anything and Jesus died in vain.
That is what the new convert was called to think about during this week long Lenten training. And if they chose to remain as part of the church, then Easter Sunday - then known as New Member Sunday - the new convert would join the church.
As time passed, church members, using a passage from Jonah, became to be more and more involved and Lent evolved into the 40 day observance we have today. Remember Jonah was called by God to go to Ninevah to get them to repent. After a detour with the fish, Jonah went to Ninevah to tell the people of Ninevah that if they did not repent in the next 40 days, God would destroy them.
In the story of Jonah after he went to Ninevah we can discover all the elements of Lent. After the King heard Jonah’s message, and realizing that the people needed to stop their evil ways and get back to God, initiated a time for the people to re-order their lives and get back to their worship of God. He began this time of renewal with ‘sackcloth and ashes.’ Just like our Lenten season begins with Ash Wednesday.
Traditionally, Ash Wednesday is a time for members of a congregation to come together and have ashes placed on their forehead. The ashes are an Old Testament symbol for guilt and grief. The Ninevites were called to sit in ashes for their guilt of straying from the worship of God. The ashes mean the same thing today.
While it is not a pleasant thing to think about all the wrong things we have done and how we have fallen short of what God has called us to do, this is one of the chief purposes of Lent. Because we cannot understand our sin and the need to re-order our lives unless we first acknowledge our sin and our shortcomings. And we cannot fully appreciate what Christ has done for us in his suffering and death on the cross unless we understand our need for a savior.



So we get 40 days consider the cost of our sin; to consider the sacrifice of our Lord for that sin; to think about the cost of our discipleship and what we are really willing to do for the work of God and for the church.
I don’t know if it is much of a practice anymore, but it once was a sacred practice to really deep clean your house every spring - Spring Cleaning. Spring cleaning was when you cleaned out all the closets and the cupboards of things you didn’t need anymore; a time when you got down and cleaned the corners and behind the doors - places that usually were neglected over the course of the year. Sometimes you would find things you forgot you had - or find things you had looked and looked for during the year but could never locate. So think about Lent as a time to do that spring cleaning in our lives. A time when we get back into the dark corners of our soul and clean out all that emotional baggage we have stored inside of us from things people have done to us or things we have done to others or issues we haven’t resolved. Lent gives us an opportunity to put all these things into perspective. To take some time to think about all these things and see how they are affecting our lives and our relationship with God and with the church. Sometimes we are so cluttered with issues from the past we cannot truly worship and serve God as he wants us to. Lent is a time for us to allow God to deal with all of this and get rid of it.
God has given us 365 days each year. He gives us these 40 days of Lent to renew ourselves so we can belong to him the other 325. This is the time of year when we can Spring Clean our selves - which needs it every bit as much as our homes. So take this time. Take a little time each day and spend it with God and ask God to help you work through your issues, your hurt, your anger, your sin. Let God help renew your relationship with him and with the church. Take some extra time each day to pray and read your Bible so that when Easter Sunday comes, we have journeyed through this time of Lent and we are clean and refreshed and ready to meet our Resurrected Savior with renewed enthusiasm and an eagerness to begin a new year as his follower.

Amen!