7 ELCIC/SASKATOON ASH WEDNESDAY SERVICE FROM KOG

ASH WEDNESDAY

Lent begins with a solemn call to fasting, prayer, and repentance as we begin our journey to the baptismal waters of Easter. As we hear in today’s readings, now is the acceptable time to return to God, our Creator and Redeemer. In Lent the people of faith reflect on the meaning of their baptism into Christ’s death and resurrection. The sign of ashes suggests our human frailty and mortality. As the ashes make the sign of the cross it proclaims that while we are dust, we have been marked by Christ for renewal and life.

The restrictions for in-person worship because of the pandemic mean that we cannot gather for the imposition of ashes.

In its place we will be participating in the long-standing biblical tradition of lament, the practice of mourning for all that’s wrong and crying out—to God and with God—to make things right. One of the ways people expressed their laments in the Bible was by rending, by tearing, their clothes. David does it when he hears of his daughter Tamar’s rape, and when Saul and Jonathan were killed in battle. Job did it when he lost pretty much everything he owned and everyone he loved. Clothing was an extremely valuable and limited resource in those days, and not something that was easily replaced. So, when they ripped their clothes to shreds, it spoke volumes. It was a way of physically expressing the pain, the regret, the shame, guilt, and the need for repentance they felt inside, a way of saying, “I am torn up. My heart is ripped to shreds.” As the prophet Joel says in the First Reading, “rend your hearts and not your clothing.”

During the reading of Psalm 51 there will be times for the tearing of fabric to signify the lament over our sinful lives as we symbolically “rend our hearts,” repent, and hearken to God’s invitation to “return to me with all your heart.”

For this you will need a piece of fabric, about 12 inches square. [It can be an old towel, sheet, T-shirt, just about any tearable piece of cloth.] Make about four half inch incisions on one side of the cloth so that it will be easy to “rend” at the appropriate times. Please make the preparations for the act of repentance and lament at this time.

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Audio File for Introduction and Readings

GREETING

Pastor: From our God who loves us with an everlasting love

who brings forth a new creation in Christ,

who leads us by the Spirit in the wilderness,

grace, love and abundant peace be with you all.

People: And also with you

PRAYER OF THE DAY

Pastor: Let us pray.

People: Almighty and ever-living God, you hate nothing you have made and you forgive the sins of all who are penitent. Create in us new and honest hearts, so that, truly repenting of our sins, we may obtain from you, the God of all mercy, full pardon and forgiveness; through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.

First Lesson: Joel 2:1-2, 12-17

Blow the trumpet in Zion;
   sound the alarm on my holy mountain!
Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,
   for the day of the Lord is coming, it is near—
a day of darkness and gloom,
   a day of clouds and thick darkness!
Like blackness spread upon the mountains
   a great and powerful army comes;
their like has never been from of old,
   nor will be again after them
   in ages to come.

Yet even now, says the Lord,
   return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
   rend your hearts and not your clothing.
Return to the Lord, your God,
   for he is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love,
   and relents from punishing.
Who knows whether he will not turn and relent,
   and leave a blessing behind him,
a grain-offering and a drink-offering
   for the Lord, your God?

Blow the trumpet in Zion;
   sanctify a fast;
call a solemn assembly;
   gather the people.
Sanctify the congregation;
   assemble the aged;
gather the children,
   even infants at the breast.
Let the bridegroom leave his room,
   and the bride her canopy.

Between the vestibule and the altar
   let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep.
Let them say, ‘Spare your people, O Lord,
   and do not make your heritage a mockery,
   a byword among the nations.
Why should it be said among the peoples,
   “Where is their God?” ’

Second Lesson: 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10

So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain. For he says,
‘At an acceptable time I have listened to you,
and on a day of salvation I have helped you.’
See, now is the acceptable time; see, now is the day of salvation! We are putting no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we have commended ourselves in every way: through great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labours, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; in honour and dishonour, in ill repute and good repute. We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see—we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.

Gospel Lesson: Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

‘Beware of practising 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.

SERMON

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HYMN OF THE DAY

“Change My Heart, O God”

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Change my heart, O God;

Make it ever true.

Change my heart, O God;

may I be like you.

You are the potter;

I am the clay.

Mold me and make me;

this is what I pray.

INVITATION, CONFESSION, AND LAMENT

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INVITATION TO LENT

Pastor: Friends in Christ, today with the whole Church we enter the time of remembering Jesus’ passover from death to life, and our life in Christ is renewed.

We begin this holy season by acknowledging our need for repentance and for God’s mercy. We are created to experience joy in communion with God, to love one another, and to live in harmony with creation. But our sinful rebellion separates us from God, our neighbors, and creation, so that we do not enjoy the life our creator intended.

As disciples of Jesus, we are called to a discipline that contends against evil and resists whatever leads us away from love of God and neighbor. I invite you, therefore, to the discipline of Lent – self-examination and repentance, prayer and fasting, sacrificial giving and works of love – strengthened by the gifts of Word and Sacrament. Let us continue our journey through these forty days to the great Three Days of Jesus’ death and resurrection.

(silence for reflection and self-examination)

CONFESSION OF SIN

Pastor: Let us confess our sin in the presence of God and of one another.

Most holy and merciful God:

People: We confess to you and to one another, and before the whole company of heaven, that we have sinned by our own fault, by our own fault, by our own most grievous fault, in thought, word, and deed; by what we have done, and by what we have left undone.

Pastor: We have not loved you with our whole heart, and mind, and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others, as we have been forgiven.