Thursday, March 6, 2025
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Fast
If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily, then follow me.
At St. Matthew Episcopal’s Ash Wednesday service, we joined millions of others around the world to pray our repentance. Among much else we said, “Accept our repentance, Lord, for our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty. Accept our repentance, Lord, for our contempt toward those who differ from us, for our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us. Accept our repentance, Lord.”
I spoke the words and felt the pain of their truth.
Carl Jung wrote, “The whole world is God’s suffering.”
Our new grandchild has just been born, and already I am thinking more of myself and my own comfort than the future being established even now for our grandchildren and children all around the world. I don’t claim special knowledge about how to put their lives ahead of mine, except to imagine a moment when I might run into traffic to push them out of harm’s way, and be injured or killed myself in the process. No doubt some of you have had an experience like this, and if you have I imagine you will never forget it, and that it changed your life for the better.
At least I can experience the pain of hunger on this one day, a day a week and especially on Ash Wednesday, when I choose not to eat and only to drink water. Our pastor never minds fasting for a medical reason, but the fasts he does for the good of his spirit always are painful. He notices food EVERYWHERE. And so, he says, it’s a good spiritual workout, because just as he notices the food and feels the hunger pangs, he remembers himself, what he’s doing after all, that his devotion to God matters more.
What did Jesus say to the devil in the desert after all?
Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God.
After school we picked up Miles and Jasper. We attended an abridged reading of A Midsummer Night’s Dream in the morning. These second graders read their lines well and acted the parts of bewitched friends-turned-lovers by the imp Puck. Miles (Lysander) led them into sleep after sleep, when Puck through their dreams had his fun.
“I love you,” words these kids just do not say to each other much, came over and over out of their mouths. And then Miles had the chance to say, “Oh! Kiss me, my darling. Oh! How I love you.” Wow. This was special. We will not forget this moment for awhile. After school when we picked up Miles from his classroom I whispered in his ear, “Oh, kiss me, my darling.” He whacked me on the head. Couldn’t help smiling.
Finn was home with his folks when we got there with his brothers, excited beyond belief to hold their brother and tickle his nose and rub his head, already full of hair. Jasper raised his shirt and showed off his nipples for a moment, pretending. Andi of course was doing the real thing, resting, nursing … resting, nursing. She watched the video Margaret made of Miles’ play, while my version was taking forever to get to her Google Photos account. The big boys cuddled with her and watched too, another sweet moment in a sweet hour of their lives.
I found a book on my shelf to read devotionally during Lent – Bread and Wine, readings chosen by the editors of Plough Magazine. It is dedicated by Jane Kenyon, poet:
The God of curved space, the dry
God is not going to help us, but the son
whose blood splattered
the hem of his mother’s robe.
If Andi had been with me at church today, she too would have noticed the confession about “those who come after us.” She too would have asked forgiveness, and asked God to accept her repentance. On these early days in March 2025, her intentions are stronger than mine. She’s a mom. The blood on Mary’s robe is more real than real for her, as she too leans into her new baby and offers him life.
I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse.
Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord, your God,
Heeding his voice and holding fast to him.
 (Deuteronomy 30, Psalm 1, Matthew 4, Luke 9)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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