If Snow Were Ashes

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

“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.

“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. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

“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. But 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.

“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

 If snow were ashes…

That’s been my working title for this sermon, since Indiana and so much of our country started to receive warning upon warning that ‘winter was coming’ over the last week or so. And that it was going to show up all at once… winter… in Indiana at least. Piles and piles of snow we hadn’t seen yet, this year, until the middle of February when it all showed up at once. And that it would hit places like Texas, too, where they aren’t so used to or prepared or able to handle what came with such weight and depth and cold.

If snow were ashes…

But that working title really hit home for me yesterday, when the first wave of all that snow had arrived, as predicted, and I did my annual dusting off of the snow blower. You know that machine that gets packed away in the Spring, parked in the far reaches of the mini-barn, until Fall rolls around and I make space for it in the garage where it sits and waits for winter and cold and snow high and heavy enough to earn its keep.

Along with the annual dusting off of the snow blower comes the annual testing of my patience when the thing doesn’t start as it should. And the annual frustration I feel as I check the oil and wonder about the spark plug and pull that rope until I break a sweat. And then the shame … oh the shame is real … for knowing, every year … every God-blessed year … that I should have started the thing a time or two or twelve since last time I used it … and probably changed the oil … and apparently used different, better gas, according to the guy at the hardware store.

If snow were ashes…

Then comes the crow I eat (whatever that means) as I recruit my boys to help me shovel – back-breaking work this time around – and as I hear the sounds of happy snow blowers, starting up without fail, in garages and driveways all around me, over the clear, driven snow. And as I watch those driveways get cleared with efficiency and ease – just as it should be when one owns such a piece of snow blowing equipment. Oh, and the mix of shame and deep gratitude for the kind neighbor who comes to our aid by snow-blowing out the biggest, heaviest piles of it all just after the city plow does a drive-by in the middle of our work and blocks the end of our driveway again.

If snow were ashes…

I say that because I think a lot of us – me included – treat the sin and death these ashes represent for us with about as much respect, regard and preparation as I treat my snow blower and the prospect of snow. I mean, I think we avoid and dodge and deny the inevitability of our sin, our shame, and our ultimate demise to the point that it catches us off-guard and finds us unprepared and leaves us frustrated and ashamed and afraid, even, too much of the time.

Which is so much of what Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent are meant to be for us: a reckoning for our brokenness and sin; a reminder that the winter of our dying will, indeed, come; and an invitation to do something – to live differently – because of it; and with hope that someone – God, in Jesus, to be specific – has and will get us out of this mess, to redeem all of it for our sake and for the sake of the world.

So what would we, could we, should we do, if snow were ashes?

Let’s stop denying that death will come – and indeed is on the way – for every one of us. Let’s stop denying the Sin that besets us as individuals and as disciples and as a people… as God’s Church in the world.

We’ve had enough, too many, reminders of that death and our Sins since our last Ash Wednesday worship a year ago have we not?

When we last shared and received our ashes in 2020, the pandemic wasn’t being called a pandemic yet. We thought it might be something like the flu and we tried to convince ourselves of that for quite a while. Too long, probably. 485,000+ deaths in the U.S. and almost 2 million more deaths worldwide later, this death is impossible to deny. (If snow were ashes…)

Last Ash Wednesday we’d never heard of George Floyd or Breonna Taylor or Ahmaud Arbery; we didn’t know who Rayshard Brooks or Daniel Prude or Casey Goodson were, either. Too many of us still keep the truth and the ugliness of the deadly racism that infects our country hidden away in the back of the mini-barn until it rears its ugly head, like it did on the steps of the US Capitol, for instance. (If snow were ashes…) 

Last Ash Wednesday, cancer and chemotherapy and radiation were things I wondered and worried and prayed about for all of you and for so many others. But it all moved into my house this summer, fast and furious, like a blizzard you might say, and things have changed for our family because of it. And, I know, the same is true for so many … some disease, some diagnosis, some treatment – or worse – find us all, eventually… (If snow were ashes…)

And this is how Sin and death come together so much of the time for us – like something we know is there; like something that could happen; like something that will, eventually happen; like something we can choose to put off or deny or pretend away. But something that looms, nonetheless. And lingers for those of us who are left behind.

So what to do? – if snow were ashes or ashes were snow, or whatever – dumped so predictably, yet by surprise in so many ways.

These ashes we wear on our foreheads and these words we hear from Jesus and the promises we read in Scripture remind us that we need not fear the sin and death that send us running and reeling, dodging and denying so much of the time.

Instead, in the midst of it all, we’re called to tend our faith. We practice our piety, faithfully and quietly – not before others, in order to be seen by them. We give our offering without expecting applause or accolades for being generous. We pray, we fast, we worship, we learn, we serve.

And there’s more. We love our enemies and we pray for those who persecute us. We love the Lord our God with all of our hearts, minds, souls, and strength. And we love our neighbors as ourselves, too – which means even more than blowing snow for the knucklehead next door, truth be told. It means recognizing that our enemies are our neighbors a lot of the time. And that Jesus died and was raised for the whole lot of us.

And we do all of this, not because we have to but because we get to. And we do all of this imperfectly, tending to our faith, I mean, like the broken, sinful, dying children that we are. But we do it with gratitude, with gusto, and with as much faith as we can find – even if that faith is too small to see or to be seen some days.

And we live this way, with hope, in spite of these ashes and all they represent, because it is by way of ashes … dust … and even death that God does God’s best work, remember.

God looks forward to repairing what is so broken in our lives and in this world.

God has plans to redeem the ashes and the soot of our sinfulness.

God promises to breathe life into the dust and dirt of our dying.

Because if snow were ashes or ashes were snow, today reminds us that none of that lasts forever. It will all melt away, in the end, thanks to the grace we know in Jesus. And Spring will come, in God’s sweet time.

Amen

In and Of Itself

Mark 1:29-39

As soon as they left the synagogue, they entered the house of Simon and Andrew, with James and John. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they told him about her at once. He came and took her by the hand and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them.

That evening, at sunset, they brought to him all who were sick or possessed with demons. And the whole city was gathered around the door. And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.

In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed. And Simon and his companions hunted for him. When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” He answered, “Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.” And he went throughout Galilee, proclaiming the message in their synagogues and casting out demons.

---

I have been wondering when or how or if I would ever find a way to tell you all about this thing I saw on HULU a couple of weeks ago. I call it a “thing” very deliberately, because I don’t know exactly how to describe it. It is a beautiful, compelling, experience of a “thing” – a piece of performance art, for sure. It is a series of stories told from one man’s perspective and also includes actual magic – card tricks, illusions, sleight-of-hand, kind of stuff – which is why I thought about it when I read about Jesus and this morning’s miracles and healings.

Anyway, this “thing” I’m talking about is called “In and of Itself,” and it was produced by Stephen Colbert and his wife, and created by Frank Oz – the master of The Muppets – and it was written and performed by some guy named Derek DelGaudio, who you’ve probably never heard of until now. And the thing about it all is that that’s about all I can tell you about this “thing,” this “show,” this “movie,” this “performance.” Because if I were to tell you any more I would spoil the magical, psychological, spiritual, mysterious experience of it and I don’t want to do that. So, consider this a pastoral public service announcement to give yourself 90 minutes – the whole 90 minutes – of uninterrupted time to see what I’m talking about. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. (If you are disappointed, I’ll beg your forgiveness later.)

But again, all of this – “In and of Itself” and the magic and the mystery of it all – had me thinking about Jesus and his miracles – about his curing the sick and casting out demons like he was wont to do. And it made me think about how we live as Christians in the world in relationship with and in reaction to these stories of Jesus and his mysterious, magical, miraculous ways.

Unfortunately, it seems we Christians sometimes feel like we have to pick a side and figure things out when it comes to such things. For some, whether you believe the magic of it all, or not, determines the strength or weakness of your faith. Maybe you buy it – hook, line, and sinker – the magic and the miracles of Jesus. Maybe you’re more cynical and skeptical and certain there’s a logical explanation to all of that. Maybe you’re somewhere in the middle – like me – and the strength of your faith in those miracles comes and goes, if you have to be perfectly honest.

Whatever the case, it seems clear Jesus didn’t want our faith to rest entirely on the presence of magic or in the practice of miracles. (He wouldn’t have asked people to keep his miracles and healings quiet, as he often did, if that were the case.) Of course, he didn’t want faith to be lost in the absence of that sort of mystery and miracle, either.

So, I like to think Jesus was as amazed and as surprised and maybe even a bit confused about what was happening to him and through him back in Galilee. He wasn’t a magician or a performer, after all, so I wonder if he expected that fever to leave Simon’s mother-in-law when he touched her. What if he was just trying to comfort his friend’s mother-in-law by taking her hand in his? And I wonder if he expected the demon to leave the possessed man we heard about last week when he spoke to him in the synagogue. What if he was just trying to offer a calming voice, and some comfort, to someone who was unsettled and unsettling to everyone around him?

I wonder if what everyone was calling “miracles” were just as curious and just as unexpected and just as awe-inspiring to Jesus himself, so that he was driven out to deserted places – like he was in this morning’s Gospel story. And I wonder if he was as skeptical or cynical or terrified and uncertain, perhaps, about what was happening that he just had to be alone to wonder and pray about what in the world God was doing with him.

Jesus never seems to be as consumed or as wrapped-up in or as concerned with how God was working miracles in the world like Simon and his companions, who hunted him down in this morning’s Gospel, might have been; or like “everyone” in Capernaum who was searching for Jesus that next day; or like we – so many generations later – still seem to be so consumed so much of the time. It seems to me we worry too much about WHO and HOW and not enough about WHY when it comes to Jesus and his miracles and the way these stories are told in the Bible.

See, more than miracles, more than healings, more than casting out demons, Jesus was about telling God’s story to whoever would hear it. He was about proclaiming and promising the love of God for all people. He was about sharing grace and mercy and compassion and good news. That is, after all, the message to be found in and through and because of every one of his miraculous acts of healing, I believe: the promise of forgiveness, the offering of compassion, the expression of mercy, the gift of new life.

What Jesus couldn’t wait to tell people is that we are loved and forgiven and welcomed in the face of our fevers and in spite of our fears; even though we have demons and diseases; and whether we’ve witnessed or received a miracle or not. That’s why he didn’t want to sit around Simon’s house. That’s what – I imagine – kept him up nights, what woke him early some mornings, what drove him out to pray in deserted places … and what inspired him to hit the road.

Jesus knew that his charge – that the call of every disciple and every one of his followers – was to get up and go out and to proclaim that message in synagogues, in homes, in marketplaces; at bedsides, to family and friend and neighbor and stranger…

Because for every fever that breaks – there’s one, somewhere, that doesn’t.

For every cure that comes – there’s another that will not.

For every demon that leaves or is quieted or cast out – there are legions that stick around and seem to win the day for too many.

And for my money, that’s why Jesus showed up – and why God calls us to show up – for the sake of the world, too: To care for the ones who don’t get the cure they’re after… To comfort the ones who are beset by burdens that never seem to get lifted… To be the answer to prayer for someone who would never expect such an answer to be shaped like you or me.

Which brings me back to that “thing” I told you about earlier – that show, that movie, that performance, whatever it is, called “In and of Itself,” on HULU. I don’t want to tell you too much more about it, not just because no one likes a spoiler but because it’s hard to explain and something you just have to see and experience to understand.

And the Good News of God’s love can be the same way. Which is why we’re called to speak of it, to share it, to become and to embody it – like Jesus did for our sake – so that others might know… and be blessed… and better… and loved in surprising, transforming, life-giving ways because of the grace we share.

That, in and of itself, is the stuff of miracles, if you ask me. And it’s holy work to which each of us is called in Jesus’ name for the sake of the world.

Amen