No End in Sight

The Proper Liturgy for Ash Wednesday is hard work. Hard work for all of us as we work through the profound call to repentance. This is a powerful service, and it works upon us effectively, evoking the "negative pole" of our religious experience. It does more than teach or remind. It evokes, makes real before our senses, out ultimate human depravity. We are dust.

In the course of this liturgy we will be called to repentance, called with a strident reminder of our mortality. Repent before it is too late. Death lies ahead of us all. It is like the figure haunting the street corner, sunken jowls, a shadowy cape, and a sign that says, "Repent, the end is near." Repent the end is near.

Repent. Any motivation that draws us into repentance is good. And I pray that the power of today’s liturgy will work upon us all and propel us into self-examination and repentance. But, in the larger picture, Ash Wednesday is not really about the end of life or the end of time or the end of everything in final, irreversible judgment. Remember, this day is the beginning of Lent. The beginning. And Lent is a road that leads to Easter, which is the most glorious celebration of the future that could possibly be.

The figure on the street corner with his placard has it all wrong. Repent, the end is near… No. Do not repent because the end is near. Repent because there is no end in sight. Repent because there is no end in sight. No end in sight of God’s blessings. No end in sight of life, or time. No end in sight of a rich, liberating life lived in relationship with God. Repent, not because there is no future ahead. Repent so that the future ahead may be whole and holy.

In a few moments we will say the Litany of Repentance. It is another powerful part of this day’s liturgy, confronting us with the infinite number of ways our human pride and frailty lead us to sin and estrange us from God. Yet there is another set of prayers we might look to today. The prayers we say at a wedding service. (This may be the only Ash Wednesday homily you ever hear that draws upon the wedding service.) The prayers that the church offers at the Celebration and Blessing of a marriage are prayers we say at the beginning of a commitment to the future. They are prayers for the building and maintaining of a committed relationship with no end in sight.

In the church’s invitation to us all to observe a holy Lent, the church reminds us of our continual need for repentance and renewal of faith. It takes work, intentionality, to maintain and nurture an on-going relationship, with one another or with God. In the prayers for the beginning of a marriage, we pray that the members of that relationship may have "wisdom and devotion in the ordering of their common life." Surely that should be our prayer with respect to God. Wisdom. Devotion to God (in the face of the many other claims upon our affection). Order. The order of regular worship and prayer and study to build a common life. A common life cannot be built or shared without that order.

In speaking of human relationships we also pray that, in their future life together, the couples’ wills may be "knit together." What a wonderful image for our hope with respect to God. Our wills… our choices, conscious decisions. We pray that our will and God’s will may be knit together. Knit together into a seamless cloth. Interwoven and interdependent at the finest level.

In the prayers for the Blessing of a Marriage we pray that when, not if, when hurt enters into the relationship, repentance and forgiveness may restore and rebuild that which has been broken. Not because the relationship is ending, but so that it may begin again, renewed and strengthened for the future. In our relationship with God, that is why we are here today.

Repent. Repent, not because of some threat or fear that the end is near. Repent out of the joyous hope and conviction that no end is in sight.

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