Jonah 3:1-10; Matthew 6:1-21
Ash Wednesday
✠ In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit ✠
We enter today into the 40 day season of Lent, a number which corresponds to the time that our Lord Jesus fasted in the wilderness, in which He suffered and overcame the temptations of the devil for us. Living by faith in Jesus, we seek to follow in His way–to put down and mortify our sin through repentance, and to grow in the holy life He has given to us purely by grace. Today’s readings instruct us in that, in the meaning of repentance and faith.
To begin with, we learn from the Old Testament reading that true penitence has some very real outward aspects to it. Sometimes we can be tempted to believe that repenting and believing only has to do with some sort of inward sorrowful or pious feelings that we have. But the account from Jonah shows us it also involves our bodies, too.
Jonah was sent to Nineveh by God to preach against it because of its wickedness. The Ninevites were enemies of Israel; they were idolaters who were known for their cruelty. They would sometimes skin their enemies alive and hang the skins on the city walls as a warning to their adversaries. You can see why Jonah wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of prophesying to them and ran in the opposite direction. But the Lord brought him back, and Jonah declared to the city, “Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.” They were given their own Lenten season. God’s judgment was about to come down upon them for what they had done.
Amazingly, it is written that the people of Nineveh believed God. You wonder what might happen if Jonah went to one of our big cities today and cried out against its wickedness and violence and immorality. Here in Nineveh, the Law of God was not met with rebellion, but it accomplished its primary purpose of leading the Ninevites to repentance. They proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth. Even the king of Nineveh laid aside his robe, put on sackcloth, and sat in ashes. The king announced to the people: “Cry mightily to God; yes, let every one turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands.”
Notice here how the repentance of the Ninevites wasn’t purely a spiritual matter but a bodily matter too. The two go together. They fasted and put on sackcloth as a way of humbling the flesh along with the spirit. They put themselves in the ashes as a sign of death they deserved. “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” Furthermore, their inward repentance involved the outward turning away from evil, stopping the sinful deeds which they had been doing. They didn’t just say, “I’m sorry” while all the while planning to continue the same way of living. Their belief in God’s judgment was real. Their desire to change was real.
Let it also be the same way for us these 40 days of Lent. Whatever your pet sins may be–gossiping, gambling, gluttony, drinking, the love of money, lust and sexual immorality, anger and losing your temper, grudge-holding, misusing God’s name, laziness, self-righteousness and conceit–whatever it is, acknowledge that you have invited God’s just judgment by it. All of us have deserved nothing but death and hell. Repent, turn away from your sin and turn to God for mercy and help in Jesus. That is literally what the word “repent” means, to turn, to turn around from embracing the things that lead to death to embracing Christ and the life that is in Him alone.
Even the Gentile king of Nineveh turned to the Lord in his repentance, declaring, “Who can tell if God will turn and relent, and turn away from His fierce anger, so that we may not perish?” This is the key point: The Ninevites put their hope not in their own turning, their own works of repentance, but in God’s turning. They relied on the hope that God would turn away from the judgment He had declared on the city. They hoped in the Lord’s mercy, and through that faith they were saved. It is written, “Then God saw . . . that they turned from their evil way; and God relented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it.”
In a very real way, the message of God to you this day is the same as Jonah’s, “Yet forty days and judgment is coming.” Yet about 40 days and Good Friday will be here. As we contemplate that coming judgment, we lose our appetite, so to speak. When a person is in sorrow or troubled or focused intently on a future goal, very often he won’t be able to eat. So also, as we enter this 40 day season, we engage in a holy fast, that our hearts and minds and bodies may be more devoted to the Word of God and prayer. Like the king of Nineveh, we set our hope on the fact that God will turn His fierce anger away from us, so that we may not perish but have everlasting life.
And our hope is certain. We live in the sure confidence that our Lord will turn His fierce anger from us, because He has turned it elsewhere, on His own beloved Son, who bore our judgment for us on the cross. The Father executed our disaster on Christ in our place by His merciful grace. And so He relents from bringing it upon us, and He does not do it.
In all of this we see that the Ninevite king was, in a way, a picture of Jesus. For again, it is written, “He arose from his throne and laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth and sat in ashes.” Our royal Lord laid aside the robe of His glory, covered Himself with the shame and sackcloth of our sin, and was laid in the dust and ashes of our death to save us. Moths would eventually consume the cloaks that were put on Jesus in mockery. Rust would destroy the spear that pierced his flesh. But neither could lay a hand on the Lord of life. Death would not the victor be over Him who hung upon the tree. The grave met its match when Jesus was laid in its dust. Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust is no longer the final word. Jesus gives the final word over our enemy: “It is finished.” Jesus rises from the dust, having taken away the stain of sin. Through Christ God relents from the disaster of judgment that was to come upon us. He raises you from the ash heap of repentance to be seated with the Prince of Peace as children of God.
Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. We know and believe that our true treasure is not worldly acclaim and the praise of men. For that reward quickly fades. We don’t give our gifts and pray our prayers and fast our fasts to draw attention to ourselves, but so that all attention is drawn to Jesus, that we might meditate on His words and share in His love ever more deeply. Jesus is your treasure.
And above all, you are the Lord’s treasure. His heart is with you. You are the focus of His love, which sacrificed all to win you back through the secret and hidden means of the cross. The Father sees in secret and honors His Son’s work, and He now reveals openly the mystery of the cross through His Word to save you who believe.
This is our joy and our happiness, even on this penitential day. The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart and saves those of contrite spirit. The Introit declares to us what the mind of God is toward us: “You have mercy on all, O Lord, and abhor nothing you have made. You spare (us) all because you are our Lord, our God.” God loves us in Christ, in spite of ourselves.
So even in dust and ashes we rejoice and are glad. For ashes symbolize something more than death. They symbolize sacrifice, the burnt offerings of old. In the Old Testament the ashes of the burned sacrifices for the sins of the people were found outside the camp. Jesus was crucified outside of Jerusalem, thereby showing the true mercy of God towards His people. Ashes on the forehead, then, are also a baptismal sign in the shape of a cross, marking you as one redeemed by Christ the crucified, recipients of His mercy. And in the midst of the Lenten fast, Jesus invites you to feast on Him who died and rose for you, to receive His true body and blood for your forgiveness, so that you may share in His everlasting life.
That is what it means to lay up for yourself treasure in heaven. Store up and take to heart the gifts of Christ. For moth and rust cannot destroy and thieves cannot break in and steal this treasure which Christ has won for you. Endure patiently in the way of the cross, looking forward with sure confidence to the Easter victory–Christ’s resurrection, and your own resurrection when He comes again.
✠ In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit ✠