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March 9, 2003; The First Sunday in Lent, Year B
    The Rev. Harold "Skip" Comer, Rector

No Chocolate!  Give up desserts!   Quit smoking!  Stop swearing!  Give up this.  Give up that.  It’s that time of year again when we are supposed to give up something and become very penitential.

What is the purpose of Lent?  Have you ever asked that question or attempted to answer it for others.  Well, here are some responses to the question.  “It’s a time when you are supposed to count up the number of sins that you have committed.”  “During Lent you get dirty looks if you slip and say alleluia.”  “ It’s when the priest wears purple and there are no flowers on the altar.”  And of course, “It’s a time when you are supposed to give up something.”

Originally Lent was intended as a time of preparation for the celebration of God’s decisive act of grace in the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Unfortunately Lent has all to often become saturated with an emphasis on self-improvement. 

I would propose to you this morning that the season of Lent summons us to look back on the impact that our baptism has had upon our lives.  How are we doing as a person who has been redeemed by the blood of Christ?  Or to put it into the words of St. Paul, have we died to the old self and come alive to a new life in Christ?^[1]

As Peter states in his first letter that we just heard this morning, “And baptism, which this (referring to the great flood) prefigured, now saves you…”^[2]  Does our baptism, our salvation, mean anything to us?  How have we done since the day that we were baptized?  Have we indeed died to the ways of sin, or have we slipped.   Is our halo tiled and our saintly white robes are they a little soiled?  Well, we don’t need another baptismal bath.  Just as the great flood was a once for all event, so is our baptism.  At our baptism God made a covenant with us, just as he did with his Son Jesus Christ.   We are the beloved of God, with us he is well pleased.  Even if we slip a little bit or a whole bunch, God still claims us as his.  What are we to do in response to this great love?

As Mark records it, after Jesus was baptized the same Spirit that descended upon him like a dove, drove him into the wilderness.  The question always arises as to why the Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness.   The wilderness represents the place of evil spirits, which Jesus must first confront before he begins his ministry.  Jesus, armed with the love and power of God resists temptation, thereby demonstrating to the whole world that when they call upon the power of God they to can resist temptation.  But alas, we are not Jesus.  We have our moments when we give in to temptation and sin.

The Church has placed the season of Lent as a time for us to reflect upon how our relationship with God is going.  It is intended to be a positive experience because it is a time of opportunity.  Even the word “Lent” itself is optimistic, coming from the Anglo-Saxon word for spring.  Each year just as we look forward to nature’s season of renewal, we should look forward with as much anticipation to the season of Lent as a time for renewing our commitment to live as a redeemed child of God.  It is an opportunity to reclaim the purpose, meaning, and hope of being a Christian.

I believe that the Exhortation or Invitation to the Observance of a Holy Lent, found in our Book Common Prayer, briefly yet accurately tells us what Lent is all about.

“Dear People of God:  The first Christians observed with great devotion the days of our Lord’s passion and resurrection, and it became a custom of the Church to prepare for them by a season of penitence and fasting.  This season of Lent provided a time in which converts to the faith were prepared for Holy Baptism.   It was also a time when those who, because of notorious sins, had been separated from the body of the faithful were reconciled by penitence and forgiveness, and restored to the fellowship of the Church.  Thereby, the whole congregation was put in mind of the message of pardon and absolution set forth in the Gospel of our Savior, and of the need which all Christians continually have to renew their repentance and faith. 

I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, to the observance of a holy Lent, by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditation on God’s holy Word.  …”^[3]   

I hope that you heard what I heard in this Exhortation.  It talks about Lent as a time of preparation to participate in our “Lord’s passion and resurrection,” of a time to prepare people for “Holy Baptism,” a time of “reconciliation” and “restoration,” of “pardon” and “absolution,” and of “renewal.”

We are invited “to the observance of a holy Lent.”  That is, a Lent which has been designated or set aside for God, in which we can renew our commitment to him and his Son our Savior Jesus Christ.

As we make our journey through Lent we are not alone.  Jesus is with us.  He has been there before us.  He knows how inviting and attractive temptation is.  He calls us to rise above this world and to seek the kingdom God.

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