Ash Wednesday [Matthew 6:1-8, 16-18] (14-Feb-2018)

This sermon was preached at Grace Lutheran Church, Childers, Tuesday 13 Feb, 7pm, and St Matthew's Lutheran Church, Maryborough, Wednesday 14 Feb, 7.30pm.

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Beware of practising your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.

Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

Tonight for our Ash Wednesday service, we read a very helpful reading from Matthew 6. This chapter is from what we call the Sermon on the Mount, which takes up all of chapters 5, 6 and 7 of Matthew. The Sermon on the Mount has many well-known passages and verses, which many of us will know well. And tonight we’re going to focus on the three topics which Jesus talks about:

I.                   Giving to the poor.

II.                 Prayer, and

III.              Fasting.

However, before we get there, let’s just go back and see what Jesus is talking about before our text tonight so that we understand the context. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus particularly preaches very strongly the law of God. Much of what Jesus says is what we should do, and what we shouldn’t do, and how God threatens to judge people who don’t think, speak and act according to his will. A few weeks ago, we were talking about how Jesus went out and said: Repent, and believe the Gospel. We have two things here: the preaching of the law, when Jesus says, “repent”, and the Gospel, where Jesus calls us to believe in it. Much of what Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount is a call to repent.

Jesus says many things in the Sermon on the Mount, where he cuts his knife right into people’s hearts, and shows them the very depths of their sinfulness. He says: I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. And then Jesus goes on to preach the law of God right in the hearts of people, to jab in that sharp knife and twist it. He preaches about anger, lust, divorce, speaking the truth and taking oaths, about vengeance and retribution, and about loving even our enemies and those who hate us. He shows us the very depth of our sinful condition and wants to lay us complete bare before God’s judgement. Now this is what the season of Lent is about and Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. It is a call to repentance, as we remember Christ’s suffering and death, and look forward to the celebration of Easter.

Now, before we look at what Jesus teaches about giving to the poor, and prayer and fasting, let’s remember the words that Jesus says: I have not come to abolish [the law and the prophets] but to fulfil them. Now, how did Jesus fulfil the law? What did he do? He made a complete, perfect, sufficient sacrifice on the cross for us, and he has made atonement for every single sin that anyone has ever even conceived and thought of in the whole world. So because of Jesus, and what he has done for us, there is absolutely nothing that we can do to earn God’s forgiveness. Everything has already been paid for, and there is absolutely no reason for it to be paid again by you. Everything is given to you completely and totally freely, without any of your works. Jesus preaches the law and he shows you your sin because he wants you to know how much you need him. If you don’t know that you are a sinner, why would you need a Saviour? And so, Jesus has taken every single sinful thought, word and deed on his shoulders, and he has died for all of it, in total, in full. And so when you look to him and put your salvation and your trust in him, then it’s all yours. You have done nothing, he has done everything, just as he raised Lazarus by the dead and spoke to him. Lazarus did nothing because he was dead—Jesus did everything because he is the giver of life.

And so—as Christians, there are certain things that Jesus teaches us about, and what we should do. Now that we believe in him, and he has given us the Holy Spirit, we are made free, and we have a wonderful opportunity to do all kinds of good things for people. But we do all these things, not because we are trying to earn God’s grace, or because we’re trying to get God to notice us, or because we’re trying to twist God’s arm to do what we want. The sacrifice for sins has already been made and now we do all kinds of good works freely, without condemnation, without needing to be afraid of messing them up.

And so in our reading tonight, Jesus says: Beware of practising your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.

Here, Jesus is addressing the whole group of people, altogether. And what he’s doing here is setting before them the final judgment. In the creed, we say that we believe that Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father. From thence he will come to judge the living and the dead. Our life and how we have conducted ourselves on this earth will be judged by God, and for everything we have done well, he will reward. For everything that we have done badly, Jesus has died for. And so, what Jesus is telling us is that just because he has died, doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter what we do anymore. If a prisoner has been let out of jail, it matters what he does when gets out, because otherwise he’ll go back in. And so in the same way, when we are set free from sin, from the devil, from punishment, from hell, what are we going do? Are we going to enjoy our freedom and use it for sin, or are we going to fight sin and use our freedom for good?

And so, Jesus puts this question to us: who do we want our lives to be judged by? By people, or by God? How we answer this question will completely change the way we act. God watches everything we do, but people don’t watch everything we do. Even the people with whom we live don’t watch everything we do. And so, Jesus says: if we practice our righteousness only when other people are watching us, then we are basically saying that God doesn’t exist. If God exists and if he judges our works and if he will reward us, then we should live our lives to be pleasing to him, not simply to please people at the expense of our faith and in such a way that we ignore God.

And so, Jesus talks about three things: giving to the poor, prayer, and fasting. By themselves, these things don’t accomplish anything before God. Because there can be bad giving, bad prayer and bad fasting. Jesus wants to show us how not to give, how not to pray, and how not to fast, so that he can show us how to do in a way that is pleasing to God.

The bad way to give, the bad way to pray, the bad way to fast is when we do it to earn our salvation, and to earn favour and grace with God. Jesus has already accomplished this, so if we do these things to earn salvation with God, then we kick Jesus out of the picture. We don’t need him as our Saviour, and we make people our Saviour instead, and we make them our judge.

And so let’s first of all look at:

I.                   Giving to the poor.

Jesus says: When you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.

Many Christians don’t help the needy at all, or don’t think they need to. Here Jesus tells you that you should, and that it’s a good thing. But in Australia especially, people think that the government should help people in need, and that if they’re poor, it’s their own fault. But your sins are your own fault too. What if God took that attitude with you? Jesus says: You always the poor with you. There is always someone who falls between the cracks. There a lot of people in our community who are in desperate need of help, and I’m not talking about money. Sometimes money doesn’t help people at all—like drunks, or drug addicts. Money can sometimes fuel their addictions.

But here’s something for you to think about. As Christians, we often give the impression to the community that we are poor and we need their money. But we have been given heaven and earth by Jesus himself who is the Lord of heaven and earth, and the resources of the whole world belong to him. He knows how to solve every single problem of every single person in our community. The government doesn’t know these things, but Jesus does. We often write people off and think they’re beyond help—especially drug-addicts or ice-addicts, and people like that. But what if we placed these people into Jesus’ hands, and asked him how we can help them, and what we can do for them? I don’t know the answer, but we have a Saviour who can do everything.

Many people make a big deal out of the all the good things they do for the poor and for the needy. It’s common for people to say what a good person they are, because they fund an orphanage in Asia, or they give to World Vision, or they work at a charity, or whatever. But any pagan unbeliever can do these things. Doing things like this doesn’t make you a good person. A good Saviour makes you a good person. He’s the one who cancels your sins—you can’t do that yourself.

And so, Jesus shows us another way. He says: When you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Jesus shows us just how easy it is for us to think we’re so good because we do something good. Our hand goes into our pocket to pull out the wallet, and then afterwards we give ourselves a big tick and a pat on the back with the other hand. Don’t even let that other hand even know about it, says Jesus!

Some people think also that what makes a good work good is their good intentions. That’s not true—people do all kinds of stupid things with the best of intentions. The thing that makes a good work good is that it’s done by a person whose sins have been taken away. Then every good thing they do has been scrubbed clean. And Jesus has taken your sins away, because he has died for the sins of the whole world, and that includes you.

Let’s have a look at the next thing, Jesus teaches us about, which is:

II.                 Prayer.

This is a very sensitive issue. People often don’t pray because they think they can do everything by themselves. And people don’t pray because they don’t think they do it right or don’t do it well. However, Jesus tells us we should pray. But first he tells us how not to pray. He says: When you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues at the street corners, that they may seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.

These people don’t need anything from God—they just need praise and accolades from other people to say, “Isn’t he a holy person?” “Isn’t she a real woman of prayer?” But prayer is asking our heavenly Father and Jesus and the Holy Spirit for help. We need God’s help, and often God puts us in a corner and at a dead-end so that we can see no way out. Then we can go to God and tell him about it, and ask for him to solve the problem. If God wants us to ask for his help, why are we so surprised that we so often feel so helpless?

And so Jesus says: When 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. Don’t make a show and tell about it—let God in on the problem, and he will solve it in his time and in his way.

Also, Jesus tells us something more about prayer. He says: When you pray, do not heap us empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. When Gentiles pray, they have techniques. They think: if I do this, I will get this. If I say this over and over again, I’ll get what I want. They pray because they think they will earn something by it, they think they can twist God’s arm to get what they want, if only they pray long enough, if only they pray enough times, if only they pray hard enough. Jesus says: Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. If God already knows what we need, why should we ask for anything? Because he wants us to pray, and he wants to demonstrate his help to you when you ask him. He wants to show you what you need, so that when you see that you need it and you can’t fix the problem by yourself, you can go to him. And if this is the case, it means that a good prayer is a short prayer. Ecclesiastes says: God is in heaven and you are on earth; therefore let your words be few. And because we are weak, often we need to tell him our short prayers again. But we know that when we leave things in his hands, they are powerful hands and loving hands. Jesus here even teaches us the Lord’s Prayer to give us the words and the model for prayer, and even specific topics for prayer.

Lastly, Jesus teaches us about:

III.              Fasting.

Many Christians today don’t practice fasting, which means going without something, whether it be food or drink or some kind of luxury. Plenty of people can fast, or diet, or practice self-control, but it doesn’t make them Christians. Also, fasting doesn’t make us worthy of God’s grace. Jesus has already paid the price.

And so, Jesus says: When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.

But here is a very interesting thing: sometimes there are Christians who think that it is a holy thing to be gloomy. Now, sure: Christianity is a serious thing. The world will end, there will be a judgment, we need to repent, and Peter says on Pentecost for us to save ourselves from this crooked generation. There is a lot to be sad about in this world, there is a lot to cry about and lament. But there is nothing holy about putting on a gloomy face. Sometimes we can think: I must be a real Christian, because I look really serious and gloomy and disapproving, and my brow is really furrowed. Now remember the Pharisee who went into the temple and said: I thank you that I’m not like that tax collector. I fast twice a week.

Now, Jesus says: When you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others but by your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

We can fast and practice self-denial with joy and gladness, because we do not have to worry about if we’ve fasted enough. Because Jesus had paid for our account, and he has died for us, and has risen for us. And so because of this, he has given us the victory in advance, and this brings us great joy. We sometimes may really be sad and need a lot of encouragement in our Christian life. That’s fine. Sadness is a good thing and Jesus cares for us in our sadness, but having joy and happiness and gladness in the Gospel is also a good thing, and Jesus shares in our joy.

So as we begin this Lent, let’s hear the call to repentance, and let the Holy Spirit to examine our hearts and show us where we are amiss. But whatever we do, whether we have the opportunity to give to someone in need, when we pray, or when we fast and practise self-denial, we are not paying for our sins, because they are already paid for. Our fellow humans are not our judge, God is our judge. He has sent his Son as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. We have no need to fear condemnation for our sins because they have been paid for, and God who sees what you do in secret will reward you. Let’s thank God for this wonderful promise. Amen.

Dear Jesus, thank you for teaching us about our sin and your righteousness. Cover us with your blood, and set us free for a life a good works which a purified and made holy by you. Amen.