Welcome to Glen Ridge Congregational Church!

Let us pray: may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.

And so we gather tonight – face to face with the reminder that we are from dust and to dust we shall return. But we also gather face to face with the promise of meeting the Risen Christ here at the table.

What then, of the road between these two stations? We begin tonight our 40 days of preparation, of a time of reflection, of prayer, of entering the great mystery of our faith. A time when we are especially called out of ourselves – a time when we are called into ourselves- in order to open ourselves to see that fresh new face of God.

To enter the mystery of our faith can be a challenge – so often words do not provide the doorway to the mystery – it’s art, music, images, symbols that can touch us in those deep recesses of our beings. It’s using our senses of smell, sight, hearing, taste, touch that can bring deeper meaning to this Lenten journey that we share. For Lent is a time of solitude as well as a time of community. As time of solitude, it’s a time of making the space to listen to a still, small voice within. And as a time of community, we make a perhaps bigger effort to pay attention to other persons’ needs.

So, the first stop on our journey is to come together to cleanse ourselves – to allow ourselves to be cleansed – through our worship seeking to be forgiven so in turn, we may forgive others and ourselves. And a powerful symbol of cleansing comes in the ashes. Why ashes? First of all, they are a reminder of who we are: the Bible tells us we came from the dust and to the dust we shall return. The first human was molded out of dust by God and then God breathed life into that dust – without the breath or Spirit of God, we are just like these ashes – lifeless. And we all need to get a perspective on our humanity, I think. The ashes assure us that we are all mortal, that we are all one in God’s eyes – that all that we are, all that we have, is a gift from God – we have nothing apart from God in our lives.

The ashes are also a sign of repentance – Lent is a time of mourning our sins – a time when we are called to repent and change our ways. In Bible times it was common for people who were mourning to dress in sackcloth and put ashes on their heads and there are many references to this in the Bible stories.

The imposition of ashes is a relatively new ritual in the United Church of Christ – for those who grew up Roman Catholic or perhaps in the Episcopal church or other “high church” traditions, this is a familiar service. I certainly remember seeing people on Ash Wednesday with the ashes on their foreheads and wondering about it. My own home church as well as any other church I’ve attended did not include this in Ash Wednesday services. It is new to me too. So, I’ve spent time this week reading and learning about the history and meaning of this ritual – in my head I have come to understand better, but when I let myself be touched with the image of the ashes themselves I found myself entering the mystery of this in a new way.

When I was a child, my father was chief of the local volunteer fire department for many years. I vividly remember going with him one summer day to see what was left, the remaining shell of a house that had burned to the ground the night before. A heavy smell of smoke hung in the humid air. There were the piles of blackened wood, almost unidentifiable remnants of possessions, terrible images of a lifetime of building a home – gone - a devastation almost indescribable. Ashes – signs of destruction. Ashes that take on a whole new meaning as we remember a horrible day over two years ago, as we still relive the terror and sorrow we all felt and continue to feel.

And I also think of ashes as cold – and cold is a good way to describe this day – it’s a cold day spiritually as we confront the darker side of our humanity…our sin…our need for repentance. It can be very cold in our souls as we do this thing, this coming face to face with darkness, with despair, with death.

But thankfully, we do not journey through this day or any other days like it alone. And that is the hint of the good news of Ash Wednesday – that hint is set before us here at the table. We remember that God has breathed life into us – we remember that promise that we will never be alone. Ash Wednesday comes along reminding us that we belong to a world of sin and death, but we are not abandoned here. The very sign of the cross on our foreheads, though made with ashes to remind us of our sins, reminds us also of that same sign made in water on our foreheads when we are baptized. It is a sign of ownership. When we and others see the sign of the cross on our foreheads, it’s a reminder that we do not ultimately belong to a world of death and sin, but to a gracious and loving God. Is that not reason for great hope, if not joy?

But we must face that darkness within – to sit with it a while – to really understand in our heads and our hearts what Easter is all about. Because the somberness, the sorrow of Lent leading up to Good Friday doesn’t make any sense without Easter. And Easter doesn’t make any sense without Lent, our time of preparation, of repentance.

And then I had another image of ashes – I remembered a visit to Coventry Cathedral many years ago – perhaps some of you have been there – in the midst of the city of Coventry stands the shell of the original 14^th century cathedral. This beautiful, magnificent cathedral church was reduced to ruins during one air raid during the night of Thursday, November 14, 1940. On this night the city of Coventry suffered the longest air-raid of any British city during World War 2. The cathedral was destroyed, not by high explosives, but by fire bombs. Consequently, the outer walls and the tower and spire remained intact, while the wooden roof, the heavy oak ceiling, the pews, the floor, and the screen were completely destroyed.

There were two precious relics that grew out of, rather than survived, this terrible destruction. A few days after the bombing, two irregular pieces of the oak roof beams – charred but still solid lengths of 12 feet and 8 feet, were tied together by wire and set up at one end of the ruins. Not unlike the twisted steel cross that still stands at Ground Zero. This “charred cross of Coventry” is known all over the world – it was placed behind the stone altar in the sanctuary, directly in front of the original wall where carved were the words, “Father, forgive.” Out of the ash came forgiveness. Out of the ash came new life.

The second relic of the ancient church which became a spark of life is what is called “the cross of nails.” As the roof burned, large 14^th century hand forged nails which had fastened together the beams littered the floor of the sanctuary. The following morning, someone formed 3 of the nails into a cross – and this cross has become the symbol of Coventry Cathedral’s Ministry of International Reconciliation. Crosses of these nails have been given to many centers throughout the world where there have been attempts to establish links of fellowship to study the meaning of Christian reconciliation in a divided world, and to encourage exchanges of young people to engage in that study. Crosses are all over Europe, Africa, Asia, America, Canada and Australia.

The shell of the cathedral remains in Coventry, next to the magnificent rebuilt Cathedral which was completed in 1962 – symbols of the hope for reconciliation in the name of Jesus Christ in our divided world and society.

Out of the ash comes reconciliation. Out of the ash comes a renewed search, a deepened commitment for peace. A commitment for peace not just for the embattled world we live in, but for us – a peace that passes all understanding. A peace that comes when we know we are held in the very palms of God’s hands – forever and ever.

So as we make this journey from Ash Wednesday to Easter both together – and in solitude, let us open ourselves, allow ourselves to be cleansed by the grace of God, and allow new life to rise again – to recognize and know that fresh new face of God.

Here we are, Lord. Send us – first to our knees admitting how we have left you out of our lives – and then to our rooms to secretly pray not only for ourselves but also for your world which so wholly ignores you. Finally, send us into that world to tell it about the slowness of your anger and the quickness of your love. In the name of your Son, Jesus Christ, Amen.

We begin this morning our Lenten sermon series, The Virtues: Practicing What We Believe. As we do, let me quote the text for our series, the words of Jesus to his disciples:

Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation upon rock; and when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house, and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But he who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation; against which the stream broke, and immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great. [1]

Not only does this passage echo our theme from this year—“Upon this rock I will build…”—but it teaches us an important piece of information about our faith. I notice that both persons building houses were disciples who had ‘come to Jesus.’ They both had faith, but one had the follow-through and the other didn’t. One knew and practiced the connection between hearing and doing, and the other only heard. One’s discipleship to Jesus lasted; the other was carried away by the flood of ‘what everyone else does.’

These two home builders focus us at our start. Let us not mistake the order between Christian virtue and faith. We need to keep the order straight, faith comes first in Christianity. It is what saves. It is the door into discipleship with Jesus. But, saying that, we must not forget that Christians live faith, putting belief into practice. This Lent we will examine several of the virtues, almost all old-fashioned. A hoped-for by-product of this series is that all of us might think about our choices and decisions during these forty days in such a way that when Easter comes they will say of us what they said of our ancient forebears: “See those Christians, how they love one another!” Virtues motivated by faith are a great power of the Gospel. When non-Christians see the way we live and care for one another, they ought to see what heaven is like. People who believe in Jesus, are different. Let’s talk about the ways we practice that different lifestyle.

The Gospel lesson for the First Sunday of Lent is the temptation story of Jesus in the wilderness. As we begin this sermon series I want to look at that story through the lens of a virtue called fidelity.

Fidelity is premised on faith. The Latin word we translate into English for faith is fides. The word refers to trust in someone or some event. In vows, the concept of faith means to keep promises. It refers to allegiance and loyalty, even devotion to a god, a country, a cause, a friend. In Christianity faith in God has a technical meaning a little different. Not only does it describe what we believe about Jesus and the world, but also the way we live our trust in God’s will and plan. The Apostle has a phrase, ‘to live by faith.’ [2] That expresses what the virtue fidelity means. While faith is partly creedal—the tenets of what we believe doctrinally—it is bigger than that. Faith is confidence in God, devotion to God, loyalty to other disciples and to God’s mission. In this respect, faith describes not just a way of thinking but also a manner of living. Hence, we speak of fidelity as a virtue of discipleship.

I have saying on the shaving mirror atop my dresser in my bedroom. I no longer remember where I got it and I cannot tell you who first said it. It may have been one of the things given to me on my Tres Dias retreat weekend. It sounds rather like C.S. Lewis, but I can’t be sure. “Put God in the center—and everything else will come together.” Christian morality calls God a priority of the first order. Other things in our lives, while important, are secondary. When we put the secondary things in first place, all hell breaks loose. When we put God first in our affections, those secondary things and people come into proper relationship, and our lives come into balance and we find contentment. It is, however, easier said than done. Those secondary things are called ‘temptations,’ because our attachments almost always vie in our hearts for supremacy. These might be immoral urges, but more often they are the good things of life: our work, marriage, patriotism, hobbies. Anything can become an idol-competitor of God and when we succumb to such temptation, we set ourselves up for trouble. There is nothing wrong with anything God created. Everything is ‘very good’ in the eyes of God. [3] But when a lesser good tries to usurp God’s throne, the world is turned upside down.

At the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, what were his temptations? (1) The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command the stones to become bread.” (2) “The devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory…if you but worship me.” And (3) “he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here; for it is written, ‘He will give his angels charge of you, to guard you.’ And ‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”

You know the stories, Jesus could do miracles. People flocked to him for their physical needs: healing, food, shelter. He could have been the greatest demagogue in history. The need was there—still is. All he had to do was get more focused on the problems than on God. Jesus also could command people and they would listen, follow him, change their ways. He could have been the greatest political autocrat in history. If he had just changed his focus from God to the exercise of power, just think what good things he could have accomplished. The third temptation was in the Temple. That is not an accident. Here was the devil quoting scripture at Jesus. [4] This is the temptation of religious power. Jesus could have built the greatest spiritual empire of all time. If he’d just unfocused a bit from God and focused instead on himself, just think how strong would have been his church! I notice in each of the devil’s three parries, the tempter tried to turn Jesus away from God, his only true source of power. If his focus merely shifted a tiny bit, think of all the good that could have come had Jesus really given his attention to these other noble things. He could have solved all the human problems, created a just political order, built a religious institution that would have revered him for his miracles and power. An interesting fact to note: the temptations are not ‘bad’ in themselves. Prof. Craddock says no one is tempted at first by the hope of becoming a bad person. [5] The temptation initially is in an action that appears to be a good thing. The problem comes when God is put in secondary status for a time, and once the political and religious reforms are accomplished, once all the hungry get fed and housed and healed, then God will be brought back. Maybe. Jesus is asked just to change the means to achieve a positively good end.

He refused. He cited in response to each temptation his fidelity to God. At one spot he quoted Deuteronomy 6:13, putting the issue plainly, “You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.” He kept God in first place in his heart. It is not that he was against feeding himself or some hungry person. It is not that he was against people who held political, business or military power. It is not that he looked down upon people who exercise authority in religious institutions. It is only that if God is put behind these other priorities, faithfulness is compromised and the result will not be as utopian as the tempter promises. The lesser loyalties will fight among themselves in our affections. The result will always be discontent, disharmony, conflict. When one puts God in first place, the other things will come together and come together better. Given Jesus’ extraordinary power and magnetism, one can see why he had to sort these temptations out before he began his public work. But many of us also have similar temptations, every day. Fidelity to God is what kept Jesus on the right track. It is not any less so for us.

The usual misconception about temptations is that they concern bad, immoral things. Often (in their proper place), they are manifestly good things. But good things that become gods are twisted into sin. In my previous church we embarked upon a very ambitious capital campaign. We had to raise far more money to accomplish our plans than, by any rights, we could possibly raise. One of the relatively new members of the church after the campaign was announced walked into my office and offered the church huge amount of money for the project. It was an significant pledge. She offered it casually as if it were not a big deal. (She had a trust fund from her family independent of her husband, and it was from these funds she made her pledge.) It was difficult for me not to be distracted by a number of issues hovering around her gift. She kept telling me that she was pleased with what I was doing for the church, what I’d done for her, and that sort of thing. She was pleased we were doing this project. She said it would really strengthen the church. All of it was true, but I must confess it distracted me from God. I was thinking about my own reputation and how this was going to be easier than I thought and when done would result in great praise for Stinson. The distance between a temptation and doing good is sometimes only a tiny span. We kept up the fund raising and got close to our goal. It was a miracle, but we didn’t quite have everything. The last few thousand dollars eluded us. Still the church plugged on and signed contracts and committed itself to construction. About this time, donor’s grown daughters and husband called me and asked to come into my office. When they sat down in my study and began to talk, I had the sinking feeling I knew what was coming. Around the edges of the short time I’d known the donor I suspected that she had an alcohol problem. Sure enough they wanted to talk about the problem and how I might help them talk her into treatment. I am embarrassed to confess to you that my first thoughts were of her promised gift, not her need for detoxification. I worried if I bungled it, the church would lose the gift and perhaps the project. In the aftermath, I’d be a loser. I don’t think I thought of our series’ text, but I should have:

Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation upon rock; and when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house, and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But he who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation; against which the stream broke, and immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great. [6]

In the end I did the right thing, we all sat down with her to intervene and get her into treatment. But I still remember how close I came to saying, “It’s not my problem.” God called me to forget my institution’s finances and to help her back to wholeness and health. I did and it worked. The church still got the pledge and the building project was completed. A few years later, long after I’d ceased to work in that congregation, when she died, I’m told she made a major gift to her church—not to me. Put God in the center—and everything will come together. Put other things in the center and nothing will come together. There was nothing ‘wrong’ with building a stronger and better church, but if it becomes an end unto itself, without God, then it becomes a demonic thing, doesn’t it?

Jesus foiled his tempter by keeping his focus on God, by fidelity. It is a virtue particularly needed in our time, I think. Next week, we’ll look at Sabbath-keeping, a forgotten virtue.

[1] Luke 6:46-49.

[2] Galatians 2:19-20.

[3] Genesis 1:31.

[4] Psalm 91:11-12 and Deuteronomy 6:16.

[5] Craddock, Fred B. Luke. (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1990), pp. 55-6.

[6] Luke 6:46-49.

This is our second sermon on virtues. I speak today on Sabbath keeping, arguably more old fashioned than anything else in our series. But it relates to all the other virtues. Keeping the Sabbath is about fidelity, it affects our generosity, under girds truth telling, and brings order and simplicity into our lives. Sabbath is the primary day a community of faith worships but that is only part of Sabbath keeping. More challenging is the commandment not to work on that day. It is contrary to many modern views on materialism and labor. In fact, you may not have ever thought about it before, but all of us know all the reasons we cannot rest one day a week. We know the pressures arrayed against keeping the Sabbath. But do we know the peace of honoring the Sabbath?

Earlier this year in our Book of Numbers study we read about Yom Kippur, the holy day of atonement for the Jewish people. This Old Testament book, in describing the obligation to observe this feast, has an odd way of expressing the idea requiring no work on that day. Moses instructed the Israelites: On this day “you shall … afflict yourselves; you shall do no work….” [1] In that text Moses spoke of a special holy day, but we know that not working on the Sabbath is partially what it means the keep that day holy. I was struck by his expression, “afflict yourselves [and] do no work [on that day].” Is observing a day of rest an affliction? Many of us define our lives not by our relationship to God and not by relationship to our family or country, but rather by what we do for a living. We work, proudly, all the time. Because of the so-called convenience of electronic communication devices we are in touch and ‘working’ anywhere, 24/7. My remarks and Moses’ thoughts should not be construed by anyone as an encouragement to sloth. Far from it. After all, the Bible does say, “Six days you shall work….” [2] Rather what I say is that we are missing balance in our lives when work becomes more important than God, our spouses, our community. Work has its place because it is the means by which we support ourselves and give to the many good organizations that make our culture what it is. It is the way we create prosperity in our nation and afford a good government. But it is not our God. As I said last week in the sermon on fidelity, no secondary thing can rule on God’s throne without dire and conflicted results. Is it possible that the stresses and anxieties we suffer have their origin in the imbalance in our lives manifested by our inability to create a rhythm in our lives, between work and rest, between our material desires and our spiritual needs?

But there is more. We are rearing the next generation by the same conflicted pattern we live as adults. I don’t know what family life is like elsewhere but in Glen Ridge, this is a big problem. For our children school, sports and various extra curricular activities are their ‘work.’ Organized recreation masquerades as play but in reality is pursued by parents and children as intensely as ‘work.’ The usual cry about the busy Saturdays and Sundays is that ‘everyone else does it.’ We seem incapable of drawing lines by ourselves to carve out genuine family-together time and time for their faith development. Were we and our children to give up work even for a day, it is, as Numbers puts it, ‘an affliction.’

There is a famous passage in Mark about Jesus and his disciples picking grain on the Sabbath and the resulting criticism of some Pharisees. After arguing the Old Testament with them, Jesus told his detractors, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” [3] Even in Jesus’ day, keeping the Sabbath was a subject of controversy and not easily done. Still, it is worth noting that he said, “The Sabbath was made for man.” What might that mean?

When the Numbers class discussed the difficulties of Sabbath keeping and its ‘affliction’ to us, Linda Seyffarth told us a story from her college days at Syracuse. The girl who lived across the hall in her dorm was an Orthodox Jew. One weekend Linda’s roommate had gone home. Friday night after Linda was in bed, she heard the door to her room open. Sheila, the Jewish girl, came into her room and went to bed in the roommate’s empty bed. Linda said she realized immediately why. Sheila’s room light had been on before going out, and to turn off the switch would have been a violation of her Sabbath. That seems small to us, but Linda’s point was not small: the Christians helped this Jewish girl keep the Sabbath. “Were it not for the rest of us, her community, I don’t think she could have kept the Sabbath each week.”

In Israel, Sabbath keeping is one of marks of each community’s faith. On Friday nights peace descends upon the whole country. Jewish and Muslim shopkeepers close their businesses and everyone breathes, “Shabbat shalom.” In turn, on Sundays the Christian shopkeepers close their stores. The identity of each religious community is partly determined by which day of the week is kept as a day of rest. No doubt as in Linda’s dorm, the various parties help each other keep Sabbath. Someone has to work the hospital wards on Saturdays and Sundays. The peace which descends is worth a great deal to each community, to Jews, Muslims and Christians. But, as Linda told us, it takes the community to keep the Sabbath. What are we doing to support one another, our families, co-workers, and children to keep Sabbath time holy?

Whole communities must strive, plan, and organize to create the sanctuary of a Sabbath, a day of rest. The least powerful are given little choice. Bosses demand work, sometimes on the day of their Sabbath. It is up to the important folks to preserve a day of rest for those at the bottom of society. Paul, speaking in 1Corinthians about the problem of congregational divisions at the communion table, could have been speaking about just this same issue. [4] He discovered in Corinth that the free members of the church were eating up the communion before the slave members could get to church. They had to clean up in houses where they worked and had to come late. Richer, more powerful members, eager to gain Jesus, forgot about the needs of others in their church and ate up everything before the poor could get there. Paul scolded them and told them to ‘wait for one another.’ In the same way, we who have choices in this society ought to protect the Sabbath days for those who don’t have our liberty: people such as children, the poor, immigrants.

Sabbath keeping is a balancing act. I take Friday as my day of rest for my own good. Nothing against you folks, but you are like a sponge. You have the ability to take everything I will give. If I work all the time—it may not seem like work to some of you—I soon dry up and have nothing but stress to give you in counsel and sermons and teaching. Jesus said, “The Sabbath was made for man.” In my experience Sabbath keeping is good for us. When I take time off each week, it helps me think clearly, recharges my batteries. In other words, it increases my productivity the rest of the week. It also blocks out time for God in my over-busy schedule. This may seem odd for a minister to say, but I have all the same excuses, difficulties and competing loyalties you do. We work and work for six days. It is wise and faithful to take one day of rest. We believe that this rhythm of work is not only good for us, but it is built into the world and human life by our Creator. [5] For several thousand years it has been a way God has been honored by Jews and Christians. By hallowing the one day, the other days are also given to God.

Perhaps the most difficult part of Sabbath keeping is saying that word which moderns so despise saying or hearing: no. Regrettably, all the virtues are difficult unless we learn how to practice the concept of no. I’m not talking about hyper scrupulosity here. If we each just think about what we do on Sunday, about the time, we’ll go a long way toward keeping Sabbath. There are decisions and choices that must be made. We take responsibility for our lives, supporting one another when necessary, saying yes to some things, but inevitably no to others. We establish priorities and order in our lives. As always, it takes practice before we get it right. That’s behind that subtitle for our sermon series, “Practicing What We Believe.”

Keeping the Sabbath may indeed seem like an affliction, but if we support one another, it can still be kept. We will be stronger and more productive for it. We’ll find our faith infusing the other days of our life. God will be honored. Honestly, some of you have never thought about this before. Why don’t you try practicing it for the remainder of Lent and see what comes? Next Sunday, I hope you’ll be here again, keeping the Sabbath, to hear Ms Reynolds’ sermon on generosity and self giving. One virtue at a time, we climb to Easter.

[1] Numbers 29:7.

[2] Exodus 20:9.

[3] Mark 2:27.

[4] 1Corinthians 11:20-34, particularly vv. 33-34. “Wait for one another.”

[5] In explaining why we should work six days and rest on the Sabbath, Moses noted how this pattern is built into the creation, saying, “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.” (Exodus 20:11).