Ash Wednesday Meditation
Psalm 51:1-12
Have mercy on me, O Gracious One, according to your steadfast love;
According to your abundant kindness forgive me where my thoughts and deeds have hurt others.
Lead me in the paths of justice, guide my steps on paths of peace!
Teach me, that I may know my weaknesses, the shortcomings that bind me,
The unloving ways that separate me, that keep me from recognizing your Life in me;
For, I keep company with fear, and dwell in the house of ignorance.
Yet, I was brought forth in love, and love is my birthright.
You have placed your truth in the inner being; therefore, teach me the wisdom of the heart.
Forgive all that binds me in fear, that I might radiate love; cleanse me that your light might shine in me.
Fill me with gladness; help me to transform weakness into strength.
Look not on my past mistakes but on the aspirations of my heart.
Ash Wednesday Meditation
The Rev Jen Van Zandt
February 22, 2023
Well, friends, given the weather this evening, I'm delighted that so many of you were able to come out tonight and many more I know are on Zoom. So, thanks to Dan Keoppel for being willing to do this for us this evening.
As we both collectively and individually seek to deepen and grow our understanding of a life of faith, “Renewing of the body of Christ” is our theme this year. So, before we go any further, since the heart is at the center of this text, I invite us all to just take a moment to check in with the state of our own hearts. If you're willing and able, I invite you to put your hand on your heart and check in or, at least, do it in your mind's eye.
Take a few cleansing breaths.
Inhale in God's spirit and exhale.
Ask yourself and God, “What is the state of my heart?”
Is it clenched or anxious or protected? Is your heart aching for freedom or cleansing? Is it passionate or angry? Is it hopeful or worried? Is it numb or checked out? Is it joyful or untrusting? Or maybe some or all of the above. If so, my friends, it's a reminder we are human.
Traditionally, as the church begins Lent, it can be a time for checking in and recognizing and naming our sinful ways and acts that need to be cleansed, renewed. The psalmist beautifully names that for us. What's not so obvious is the psalmist’s trusting in God’s desire and ability to change and transform all that is unclean, divisive and sinful.
To take the six weeks of Lent to assess and name all that is wrong with our behavior and our words and thoughts and deeds, I believe defeats the really true purpose of Lent. While yes, it is definitely a time for us to seek a clean and contrite heart and a right spirit, it's not a one-way street. It's actually a partnership with God.
Walter Brueggemann says it like this, “When we pray, ‘God, when you enter my heart and my life, then my life will never be the same again.’” James Mays, who's a Psalmist scholar, says “…this psalm is not merely an expression of human remorse or preoccupation with our failures and guilt, it looks beyond the self to God and lays a hold of the marvelous possibilities of Grace.” Wouldn't that be a wonderful Lent instead of heavy laden with our burdens and our guilt and the things we still hang on to; that we open our minds and hearts to the marvelous possibilities of Grace?
This psalm, which is a prayer, is a reorientation away from shame and blame and instead it’s towards a freeing; a cleansing where the mind and the will are open and oriented, not to self or to other, but solely to God.
As John says in his gospel, “He must increase. I must decrease.”
As you know, with every choice of a version of scripture, there are pros and cons, and one of the lost lines in this particular Psalm that we read tonight is missing. But it's worth noting, because in the NSRV, which is the closest translation of the Hebrew, verse 6 says: “You desire truth in my inward being. Teach me wisdom in my secret heart”.
I've been baffled by this for years. I thought the secret heart was a reference to the self that no one knows besides God--the fearful, the ugly, the dirty, the negative, the unpleasant. But it turns out the translation actually means the “secret heart” is the part of our heart… that's actually closed off to God.
I think that's the very place where God is inviting us tonight and for the next forty days; to open ourselves to God's beauty, to God's grace, to God's love, to God's tenderness, to God's freedom--all the things that we cannot accomplish for ourselves. That's a very different kind of Lent than what we’re used to. I think that's a Lent that God is desiring for all of us…a place of freedom. A place of peace.
There are only two places in the entire Old Testament where the Holy Spirit is named--this is one of those places. The Holy Spirit is with us to bring us healing and freedom and joy and hope beyond even our own doing and our own good works and our own prayers.
So, I invite us to, again, put our hands on our heart--to our “secret heart”. And now ask God to help us see the state of our “secret hearts”--the place that God wants to open--and breathe in new life, so that we can help others do the same.
And I pray, as we receive these ashes, that our hearts are even more open than
they were even 10 minutes ago. May it be so. Amen.