Date: March 2nd
Preacher: Pastor Ashley Rosa-Ruggieri
First Reading: Joel 2:1-2, 12-17
Psalmody: Psalm 51
Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10
Gospel: Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” This is the start of the Lord's prayer as we say it in worship, as it has been said for hundreds of years by Christians throughout history. It is these words that we will stop and reflect on today, as we enter into the season of Lent. Ash Wednesday is only the start of the season and offers us an opportunity for repentance, reflection, and rumination together, as we journey with Christ to the cross. This season of Lent we will be focusing in on The Lord's Prayer during our Wednesday services, and breaking it into parts so that each week covers a different theme. So this week, we focus in on “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.”
The first part, “Our father in heaven,” is only the start of the prayer, and allows us to claim the community of faith around us by stating “OUR Father.” Acknowledging that we say this prayer as a whole church, not as an individual. We then move to the second part of that sentence and remember that although we know God has promised to always be with us, we will some day be with God in the glory of the resurrection. We will be with Our Father, in heaven. Jesus references the Father in heaven in our Gospel passage today, explaining that wherever God is, our actions can still be seen. Our own promises of death and resurrection from God tell us that when we pray to our Father in heaven, we declare God's everlasting presence both with us now and in heaven as we arrive at the resurrection. The Gospel story continues with Jesus teaching those around him about how to participate in faithful practices in ways that are humble and do not center the one practicing.
Jesus is telling the people that as they do different devotional practices, much like ones that people today participate in during Lent, they should not misuse their faith in God's name for their own reputation. Practices like praying or fasting, when done in a healthy way, can be faithful acts of devotion, but not when they are turned into a symbol of someone's own righteousness. When we pray that God's name be hallowed in the next line of the Lord's prayer, we are praying that it be kept sacred, holy, and untarnished by humans claiming to speak for God in harmful ways. We pray each week that God's name remain as holy as it is, despite humanity's attempts to use it in ways that are far from sacred.
In some ways this part of the prayer is even an extension of the commandment to not use the Lord's name in vain. This commandment is not about saying a swear word, but about using the name of God in ways that justify harm to others. And so we pray that the Lord's name might continuously be hallowed, so that it is a name of mercy, justice, peace, and compassion, rather than one of cruelty, inequity, conflict, and pain. These words, Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name, are the opening of the prayer that we pray each week as a faithful witness to our call as Christians here on Earth remembering God's promises.
Still, this prayer can be a tall order for us as Christians, and these words are only the start of the prayer. The season of Lent is a time during the year where we can focus on living out these prayers that we pray in our own lives, so that they might become actions and not just words. By doing this, our lives become an active embodiment of the words we pray. In Psalm 51, there is a prayer for our own lives to reflect God's will. The words plead God for a clean heart and a right spirit to be placed in our hearts. In this way then, we can be better prepared to speak God's name in ways that are faithful and true to God's will.
Throughout our lives, we can have hope that the words of this psalmist ring true to our own desires, so that we are able to drop our own prideful actions done in the name of God, and instead follow Jesus on the way to the cross with hearts yearning to be clean and spirits urging to be righted and renewed. This is not something we do alone, but in community, with accountability to one another. We do everything in community so that no one is left by themselves or left discouraged. Just like the journey of the season of Lent, our journey of faith is never done alone, but always in the full body of Christ.
During this Lenten journey that we embark on this day, I hope that we can support one another in our faith growth, however that might look for each of us. Sharing the burdens we encounter with one another, so that they do not become too heavy a load to bear. Today as Ash Wednesday we acknowledge the start of Lent, and along with it our own death. Remembering that God formed us as humans from the dust, and we will some day again return to the dust of creation. Between being formed from the dust and returning to it, that is the time that we have to live in a way that faithfully follows Jesus. A way that upholds God's holy name, and encourages each child of God to grow together as the full body of Christ. As part of our Lenten series on Wednesday nights, I will always try to pose a question, something to reflect on and consider as we continue in our study of The Lord's Prayer throughout Lent. So as we begin this season today, I leave you with this first question to reflect on individually and together: How are we practicing the Lord's Prayer actively in our lives, so that we are using God's name in ways that keep it holy, sacred, and hallowed?