Bill Harkins
Matthew 6:1-21 6“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven. 2“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 3But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
5“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 6But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
Today is Ash Wednesday, and many of us will receive the imposition of ashes with the words, “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” As we discussed in our final “Walk in Love” class on Sunday, Lent is based on the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness being tempted by Satan, a Hebrew word meaning “adversary.” I have long understood this to mean that Jesus, being both fully human and fully divine, faced the same temptations with which we are often faced. Theologian Henri Nouwen described these in this way:
Nouwen argues that the first temptation, to turn stones into bread, represents the temptation to focus on immediate needs, immediate gratification, and appearances, rather than on a deeper spiritual purpose. Jesus, instead, chooses to prioritize the Word of God over satisfying immediate hunger. This can often take the form of needing to be in control and the abusive misuse of power.
The second temptation, to jump from the temple parapet, represents the allure of seeking attention and validation through dramatic displays rather than through genuine service and humility. Jesus refuses to be a “stunt man” and instead chooses to live a life of service and obedience. This can also be understood as the need to be special, and can lead to narcissistic, entitled behavior.
The third temptation, to worship Satan in exchange for worldly power, represents the danger of prioritizing control and dominion over love and service. Nouwen emphasizes that true leadership is not about wielding power but about serving humbly and following Jesus.
Nouwen’s reflections on the temptations of Jesus are not merely historical interpretations but are meant to be relevant to contemporary Christian leaders and followers. He encourages a focus on humility, love, and service over power, fame, and endless, narcissistic self-promotion. We could certainly benefit from more of the former in our lives today.
And so, we begin this desert, Lenten wilderness journey marked with ashes, the sign of our mortality. There is wisdom in these ashes. If you have ever been very sick, or lost a loved one, or experienced a deep loss of some kind, you know the clarity that an awareness of our bodily limits—our human finitude, can bring. How, suddenly, what is most important in life rises to the surface. This is the invitation of Lent, to realign our priorities. In remembering that we will die, we are called to remember God, however we understand this, who is the source of our life. For this we sometimes need signposts on the wilderness trail. On my trail runs in the wilderness, both in Montana, and the Comanche Peak National Forest in Colorado…
…or a local trail run in the southern Appalachians,
…stacked stones, known as cairns, can be helpful, especially when we are not sure which way to go. As we discussed in class last Sunday, our spiritual disciplines can help us along the way, just as they did for Jesus during his 40-day sojourn in the desert.
When we are marked with ashes on our foreheads, we hear the invitation to “repent and believe in the good news.” One of the Hebrew words for repent is nacham. The root of this word means “to draw a deep breath” as well as to be deeply moved by a feeling of sorrow, letting it teach us what we may need to learn. The Greek word for repent is metanoia, which means “to reconsider.” But it is also a compound word made up of the words, “meta” and “nous.” “Meta” means “transformation” and “nous” means “soul.” So, as we begin this journey, we are invited to nothing less than a “transformation of the soul.”
And this requires letting go, or “kenosis.” Jesus is our ultimate model of kenosis. In his divine identity as God, he could have played the ‘God card’ to prevent his suffering and establish his kingdom by force, but he resisted the temptation to do that. Instead, our scripture says that Jesus “didn’t equate equality with God as something to be grasped, but instead he “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave (or servant), taking on human likeness. And then as a human, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.”
This idea of kenosis is one of those mysteries and paradoxes that we encounter as followers of Jesus. I’m still trying to grasp it and understand what it means. It’s like Jesus saying that to save your life, you must lose it. But how are we transformed and believe the good news? How are we to have hope when our lives are faced with the struggle of trying to make our way in the world, when loved one’s face illness, or we have gone through a loss of some kind, and when we are uncertain which was to turn? Certainly, our journey through Lent is toward the season of Easter, a season of resurrection, but how do we get from here to there?
This week and next, the Beech trees (Fagus Americana) locally are letting go of their leaves in a kind of second autumn, after holding on all winter…holding on and letting go. The old leaves are being gently released by the new growth only now emerging. What new growth might be awaiting you on your Lenten journey?
As Richard Rohr said this week:
“There’s an inherent sadness and tragedy in almost all situations: in our relationships, our mistakes, our failures large and small, and even our victories. We must develop a very real empathy for this reality, knowing that we cannot fully fix things, entirely change them, or make them to our liking. This “way of tears,” and the deep vulnerability that it expresses, is opposed to our normal ways of seeking control through willpower, commandment, force, retribution, and violence. Instead, we begin in a state of empathy with and for things and people and events, which just might be the opposite of judgmentalism. It’s hard to be on the attack when you are weeping.”
Yes, running on unfamiliar trails, it is good to have signposts along the way, cairns made of stone, and places to pause, and to rest. In the silences one may hear, and perhaps see, streams unheard before. As Wendell Berry wrote in this liminal and well, harrowing sonnet:
Sit and be still
until in the time
of no rain you hear
beneath the dry wind’s
commotion in the trees
the sound of flowing
water among the rocks,
a stream unheard before,
and you are where
breathing is prayer.
~ Wendell Berry, Sabbaths
Perhaps we are called to do likewise—to sit and be still and listen and look for the transitional spaces in our lives where our gifts and graces might find life and find it authentically. I have come to believe that there are often two kinds of journeys. The first is like that of Odysseus, the protagonist and hero of The Odyssey. Odysseus wants nothing more than to return to Ithaca, and to Penelope, and all that he knew, and had left, and longed to see again. Everything that happens—the movement of the entire narrative—is in the service of getting back home. Contrast this with, say, the journey of Sarah and Abraham, whose destination was unknown even to them, and who paradoxically came “home” to a place they had never been before. It is a journey reminiscent of T.S. Eliot’s lovely lines from Little Gidding: “We shall not cease from exploration; and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started, and know the place for the first time.” Kenosis, metanoia, transformation.
In this paradoxical dialectic, only on the condition that Abraham reliquishes almost all that keeps him trapped in his past—and trying to get back to a familiar home—is it possible for him to move into the Promised Land, to go home to a place he has never been. This is the nature of our summons as Christians, and it is the Lenten journey to wholeness.
Blessings, friends, on your Lenten journey. I’ll catch you later on down the trail, and I’ll see you in church!
Bill+