Today is the first Sunday of the season of Lent. For many centuries, Christians around the world have observed the season of Lent as a time of reflection and prayer for 40 days leading up to Easter Sunday.
It’s 40 days, because 40 is a significant number in scripture. We heard it in today’s reading: After he was baptized, Jesus was taken by the Spirit into the wilderness, where he remained for 40 days. For Jesus, it was 40 days of temptation, fasting, and prayer. In many ways, it was an “in-between” time, a time that separated his life before baptism, when he lived mostly in private, and his life after baptism, when he engaged in his public ministry.
The number 40 is used a lot in scripture. Moses spent 40 days on Mount Sinai with God (Exodus 24:18); Elijah spent 40 days and nights walking to Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19:8); God sent 40 days and nights of rain in the great flood of Noah (Genesis 7:4); The Hebrew people wandered 40 years in the desert while traveling to the Promised Land (Numbers 14:33); and Jonah's prophecy of judgment gave 40 days to the city of Nineveh in which to repent or be destroyed (Jonah 3:4).
Each of these periods of time was an “in-between” time, an interim period that separated what came before, and what came after. They were periods of transition; transformation; periods in which the old was dying, and something new was being born. Some would call them liminal periods.
Liminal means “on the edge of something new.” In ancient myths, a person occupies liminal space when they realize that they have been called to grow or evolve into something new, but they haven’t quite figured out what that “something new” is, completely. Liminal time is a time of figuring things out.
That’s what the season of Lent is. It is an “in-between” time. A liminal time. It comes in between winter and spring. The groundhog predicts six more weeks of winter, and the church calendar gives us six weeks of Lent.
And it is a time when things are changing. The days are getting longer. The English word for this season - Lent - derives from an ancient word for spring, and refers to the lengthening of days.
That’s just one of the changes I’m sensing in this season of Lent; in this year of 2021.
I do feel a hopeful optimism every year when I notice the sun rising a little earlier each morning, and setting a little later each evening.
But there are other changes happening. Our church board - at last Sunday’s board meeting - dared to discuss the possibility of gathering for worship, in-person, in our sanctuary, perhaps by Easter Sunday. How much joy that would bring me, to see your faces on Sunday morning!
Also: vulnerable populations are getting the vaccine… and the number of new COVID cases is going down; and Long Beach Unified said in-person classes will resume at the end of March for elementary schools.
Things are still being figured out. Not all our questions are answered. Which is how things are when you’re in a liminal period…
One thing I’m trying to figure out is: what will worship look like when we are able to all gather together in our sanctuary?
Because all the experts are saying that things won’t ever go back to the way they were. Not completely.
Because of COVID, our world is changing. And if we are wise, we will allow our changing world to guide us in a new direction.
I’m thinking of the way spacecraft like Voyager, Galileo, and Cassini use one planet’s gravitational pull to redirect their path and slingshot them further into space…
COVID has redirected our path. Maybe we didn’t want to change our direction, but now that change is inevitable, let’s let that change slingshot us in a new direction toward some new, unexplored part of space, where new possibilities await.
I’ve already noticed some changes to our worship service which, really, have nothing to do with COVID. For one thing, my preaching has changed. Have you noticed?
With a whole new way of doing worship, streaming online, reaching people who we’ve never reached before, people from far away, people who have never in their lives set footin our sanctuary, I realized early on that I needed to change some things.
By the way, if you are one of those who I’m talking about, who have started worshiping with us online during this time of COVID - thank you. Thank you. You have helped me grow in faith and grow as a preacher in ways you probably aren’t even aware of.
This past year, everything has been different, which has forced us to question and rethink everything. So I’ve been questioning and rethinking how we do ministry, how we do worship, and how I craft my sermons, and how we as a church can be more loving and more helpful to those who God calls us to love.
It’s humbling, but I’m grateful. I want to learn. I want change. I want to grow.
And some of my reasons for wanting to learn and change and grow are personal.
In the past few years, my own children have transitioned from childhood to adulthood, and I’m all too aware of how often people experiencing that transition from childhood to adulthood leave the church.
They find nothing meaningful or helpful at church, nothing that helps them deal with the monotony, the drudgery, the meaninglessness of daily life - not to mention the trauma and the injustice of daily life.
Yet the gospel we claim to represent is a gospel that saves lives. It’s a gospel that, in fact, leads people through the wilderness of their own lives, toward a new life of hope, love, and affirmation.
The gospel literally offers life in a world of death, hope in a world of despair, love in a world of hate, and acceptance in a world of judgment. The gospel provides a safe place to those who are threatened and vulnerable. The gospel takes the dust and ash of our lives, and reveals it to be something sacred and holy.
Now, if we’re presenting that gospel - that good news - in a way that is boring or irrelevant, then we’re not doing it right. And we need to change.
I mentioned that my preaching has changed...Some of these changes have been intentional; others, not so much.
Among the intentional changes are my introducing myself at the start of each and every sermon, and including my pronouns when I do so.
Among the unintentional changes is something I’ve just started to notice. In seminary, I was taught to spend the first part of each sermon by talking about the scripture - explaining it, interpreting it - and then, at the end of the sermon, applying the lesson of that scripture to the lives of my congregation.
And that’s how I tried to preach for many years.
But at some recent point, things started to change. I think the change started even before COVID, but COVID helped it along, kind of like how the gravitational pull of Jupiter and Saturn helped the voyager spacecraft continue its journey to the outer reaches of our solar system.
Now, when I preach, I’m just as likely to start by describing some contemporary situation; describing some social reality… and then, at the end of the sermon, tie that in to the scripture reading.
It’s just the opposite of what I learned in seminary.
But I think it’s a good change. Too many church leaders have used scripture to beat and spiritually abuse people, and even I find myself cringing and recoiling when someone starts by saying, “the Bible says,” without first taking the time to understand me or my situation.
I don’t want to be like that.
So I’m trying to figure out how I can be a better witness to the gospel, which isn’t always easy. I feel like I’m out here in the wilderness, trying to figure this out, trying to discern what is the best way to preach and do worship in a world that is so very different from the world that existed when I was in seminary, a world where the presentation of the gospel has often failed to be the good news that it’s supposed to be.
And that’s the task before us all: how do we worship and do ministry and present the gospel in a world that is now - and forever will be - so very different from the world we once knew?
This is how it feels to be in the wilderness. This is how it feels to be in a liminal place.
In every wilderness journey, there is temptation.
The Israelites were tempted to return to Egypt. Why? Because it was familiar to them. In times of great change, don’t we all long for what is familiar?
Yet the Promised Land lay forward, not backward.
Jesus was tempted with power - the power to command armies, the power to turn stone into bread. (Mark leaves those details out, but the other gospels fill them in.) Yet in the kingdom of God, power is exercised through love, not coercion; and bread is for sharing and eating together, not as a shortcut to one’s own satisfaction.
Are we also tempted to hold on to what is familiar, rather than move forward in love? Of course we are! I know I am. Doing worship and ministry in a way that I’m familiar with is comforting and easy.
But if there is one thing this past year has taught me, it’s that I need to get used to doing things in a new way.
Now, we’re in Lent. I’ve heard some say that this whole past year has been one long season of Lent. Lent is an unsettling time, disconcerting time, so it feels like last year’s Lent never ended, but just continued for a whole year.
Lent is unsettling from start to finish. Lent starts by forcing us to contemplate dust and ashes, and ends with stories of denial, betrayal, arrest, and crucifixion.
It’s unsettling, as any liminal season is.
It was unsettling for the Israelites to be in the wilderness, wandering in circles until they were finally able to shake off their old patterns of behavior and old ways of thinking. It was unsettling for Jesus to be in the wilderness, tempted by Satan.
But in every unsettling, liminal, in-between time, there are the seeds of what we are growing in to. The buds are already there, even in winter when the tree is bare.
That’s where I feel we are at right now. That is what this particular season - Lent, 2021 - is for me, and, I think, for us. A new and glorious spring is coming, one that won’t look like seasons past - and right now, it’s our job to care for the flowers that have not yet appeared but which are on their way.
And how do we do that?
Well, it starts with our own personal faith journeys. How is God calling you forward on your journey of faith?
Many people engage in new practices during Lent, or try to get rid of distractions to a life of faith. Some will give up meat, on Fridays like my dear Catholic grandmother did, as a reminder of Christ’s time of temptation and his sacrifice. Others will give up chocolate or some other food.
Some people will give up time - time spent in some other activity is now spent each day in prayer.
The truth is that there are countless ways you can help the bud of faith grow into a flower.
Last week I talked about seeing the holy image of God in every person, including yourself. If you have trouble seeing yourself as holy, maybe your practice for Lent would be everytime you step out of the shower, to stand in front of a mirror and try to see yourself - your whole self - the way God sees you, as a beautiful, beloved, holy child of God.
Nurture that bud in you, so that the flower can emerge. Every time you look in the mirror, say: “I am a beautiful, beloved, holy child of God.” I’ll even give you one of the markers we used to write on the mirrors in the fellowship hall that one time, and you can write those words on your bathroom mirror. “I am a beautiful, beloved, holy child of God.”
Not everyone has to give up meat or chocolate.
I was about to start this last section of my sermon with the phrase, One final thing… But there is no one final thing. An in-between season of liminality like Lent leaves you feeling like things are unresolved; the end isn’t really the end. We’re still stuck in the middle.
We have some hymns like that in our hymnal, where the final chord leaves you hanging, and it is so, so tempting for musicians to change it or add in one more final chord, so that the song feels finished.
“This is a Day of New Beginnings” is a song like that. Each verse ends in a way that leaves you hanging. That final note and chord lets you know that something more is coming.
But in the last verse, the chord is different. I’m not sure if that’s the original composer who did that, or if someone else did that. But they wanted it resolved.
But sometimes, we need to get comfortable with feeling uncomfortable, with leaving things unresolved, at least for now. As long as we’re in the wilderness, things will feel that way.
But that’s OK. It is that sense that things aren’t yet resolved, that we’re still journeying, still on our way, still becoming, that keeps us open to the possibilities.
So if nothing else, this Lent I encourage you to be open to the possibility that things aren’t finished yet. Your life is not yet all the way to where it is headed.
This is especially important to remember if your life is in a bad place right now. You’re not yet at the place to which you are headed.
So take courage from the wilderness journeys of the Bible. Keep going. Don’t turn back.
And for our church, know that we’re still on our way. We’re still becoming. We don’t everything all figured out, and that’s OK. As long as we keep our minds open, God will show us the way; maybe, just one step at a time. And we’ll keep moving forward.
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