[Joel 2:12-19 / 2 Peter 1:2-11 / Matt 6:1-6, 16-21]
"Yet even now," declares the Lord, "return to me." That is the heart of Lent. The utterly gracious invitation to come back home to the Lord. And what keeps us away? The passing joys of sin? The weight of shame, thinking there's no way He means me. Not after all I've done.
But no. He does mean you. He means exactly you who are hiding in shame like Adam and Eve among the trees of the garden with their fig leaves. He calls you and says: "Even now, return!"
We were kids then. My cousin Gary was maybe 10 or so. That would make me seven. And we were doing a dumb kid game. The driveway had rocks. Pretty gray rocks. Big enough to hurt if you got walloped with one. So we were walloping each other. And I'm not a very good aim. Never have been. I walloped Gary with a rock right in the mouth. Oh, boy. Blood, tears, and running to the house. Gary, I mean. Not me. I stayed outside for the longest time. Why? Because I was ashamed of what I had done. And I was proud too, and didn't want to say "I'm sorry" when I wasn't the one who thought up the game; just the one with the bad aim. And in pride and shame - weird how often they mix together - I tried to avoid the house.
But I was hauled in, nonetheless, to both apologize, be exhorted not to play stupid games, and to find out that after all I was still WANTED, still a member of the family after all. "Even now."
"Yet even now," declares the Lord, "return to me." What's the content of your "even now"? What are the sins that you've been clinging to in pride and shame? Who've you hit lately with the stones you've been throwing about? What damage have you caused others? Sending them bleeding inside and crying out in pain? Where have you been lurking, trying to avoid the moment of accountability, the moment of confession and forgiveness?
Wherever you've been, whatever you've done, your God says to you tonight: "even now, return." But how does one make the return? The prophet told you: "with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning" and to safeguard you from any sort of externalizing of the return, he adds: "and rend your hearts and not your garments." That last bit is very important. If Lent becomes about externals - about the ashes and the going without food - while the heart continues cheerfully in sin not returning by repentant faith to God, then it's a waste of your time. Not that the externals don't matter, but that you know as well as I do how easy it is to observe the external and leave undone the matters of the heart.
And so when Jesus picks up the call to return in today's Gospel he warns precisely against the externals as show, of "practicing your righteousness before others in order to be seen by them." Then their admiration is what you're seeking, and that's what you get as your reward. Enjoy it, it doesn't last long. To avoid the temptation and to allow the externals to remain connected vitally to the internal, Jesus invites a cloak of secrecy to fall upon them all. Notice that our Lord doesn't say that giving, praying and fasting can be abused, so don't do them. Rather: Give, but don't let your left hand know what your right is up to, and Your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Pray, but don't do it out on the street corner or standing up solo in church for folks to admire you, rather do so in private, speaking to your Father who will meet you in the secret place and reward you. And when you fast don't make a big do of it, so that folks can admire your self-control. But keep it to yourself, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. In each of the Lenten disciplines: giving, praying, and fasting, Jesus invites real return internally by taking them off the stage so that you're not playing for an audience, but in the secret place, in your heart, you are returning to God: for He is the one who meets you in the poor, in prayer, and in the hunger of body and soul.
Such return the baptized constantly need, for we constantly fall from this life that God has given us in Christ. Peter reminds us of the riches God has given in Christ: "His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire." He's given you His promises, says Peter, and in them is everything you need for life and godliness for God is in them and through the promises you find Him, you return to Him.
But promises are meant to be used, and you use them by trusting them. And that's where the heart comes in. The return of the heart to God happens through trusting His promises. He calls you to come out of the shame and come home. Yes, even to face up to the fact that every stone you've thrown that hit and hurt someone else was ultimately aimed at Him, and that He in love took all the stones you've tossed in your life and He endured them all. His cross was all about that. "Against you, you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight" said one repentant sinner coming home to God. He said that not to minimize or deny the hurt that he had in fact inflicted on Uriah, on Bathsheba, on the child, on his whole family, but it was the gift of divine wisdom to see that behind all sin is the rejection of God himself. And that to turn from sin is therefore always to turn to God. His promises enable that return to be made. So we kneel before the Crucified and confess our many sins and ask His forgiveness - for they've all fallen on Him and He's carried them in His body to death so that they would not be the death of us. As the proof of this, He gives us the body and blood that bore them all. Forgiveness beyond imagining - promise and so participation in the divine nature.
"Even now, return." Trusting in His promises, in His forgiveness, His mercy, we heed the Apostle Peter's call to make every effort to supplement our faith with virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brotherly affection and love. We know that if these qualities are ours and are increasing they do not leave us ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. We don't want to be among those who lack these qualities, for that can only mean that we have forgotten that Christ has cleansed us from our former sins. Not forgetting, but remembering, even now, we return to the Lord. Giving, praying, fasting, He meets us, bestowing upon us unworthy sinners the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever with His unoriginate Father and all-holy, good and life-giving Spirit. Amen!
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