{"id":9806,"date":"2021-02-07T19:49:36","date_gmt":"2021-02-07T19:49:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theologie.whp.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/?p=9806"},"modified":"2022-10-06T10:45:47","modified_gmt":"2022-10-06T08:45:47","slug":"matthew-61-6-16-21","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/matthew-61-6-16-21\/","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The Spirit of Lent<\/p>\n

Beauty is only skin deep, so the expression goes. I guess that is a
\nwarning to gullible men not to be attracted only to the outward beauty
\nof a woman, but to look more closely at the inner, the spiritual beauty,
\nif you wish, of a woman. I know that a woman whose makeup is always meticulous,
\nis a one who spends hours in front of a mirror. Men, you will have to
\nwait a long time on that kind of woman.<\/p>\n

Jesus‘ words to us, from that part of the Bible called, the Sermon on
\nthe Mount, seem to tell us much the same. Watch out that your piety,
\nyour spirituality is not just on the outside. Do your good works in response
\nto what God has done for you. If you do it for what people will think
\nof you, that’s all you are going to get out of what you do.<\/p>\n

Lent is a special time for people who trust in Jesus as the One who
\nrules and as the One who brings wholeness and healing to lives. It is
\na time to examine their lives, to do something about their spiritual
\nlife, to reflect again in depth I would hope on what Christ Jesus has
\ndone for them, and to get in touch again with the core values of their
\nrelationship with God through Jesus our Savior.<\/p>\n

That is the spirit of Lent. It will walk you through the sufferings
\nof our Lord, the commemoration of his death on Good Friday, the pause
\nof total emptiness which takes place on Holy Saturday, and then the next
\nday’s explosion of the myths and fears of our lives as we begin to get
\nin touch with the new reality: Christ lives! We shall also live!<\/p>\n

The spirit of Lent, these 40 weekdays before the Festival of the Resurrection,
\nis to expose the error of our lives known as formalism, of external piety.
\nJesus warns us: „Beware of practicing your righteousness before
\nmen to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father
\nwho is in heaven“ (Matt. 6:1). It is quite simple. You cannot seek
\nto please both God and man at the same time. You can’t play to two audiences
\nat the same time. You can please one or the other, but not both.<\/p>\n

That sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it? It is, in reality, much more
\nsubtle than it seems on the surface. No devout Jew, and certainly none
\nof us would try to please God and disregard God at the same time. We
\nknow that would be quite stupid.<\/p>\n

But how much today don’t we believe that God approves of us because
\nwe seem to have man’s applause, and\/or the approval of our peers. Quite
\nsimply, if you want to know how well you are doing spiritually, see what
\nyour associates are saying about you. If that is how you judge how well
\nyou are doing before God, well, then, get as much praise from others
\nas possible.<\/p>\n

Jesus explodes that myth. He says you cannot serve God and get man’s
\napproval at the same time. And if you do gain the approved of men, then
\nyou get people’s approval, but you forfeit any possibility of „reward“ from
\nGod.<\/p>\n

The spirit of Lent is that we want to know the God who loves us enough
\nto send his one, his only, his beloved Child to this world to rescue
\nus from this false and finally fatal sin, we want to know God is getting
\nour message when it comes to our spiritual and our charitable acts. That
\nmessage is: we are beginning to understand your sacrifice for us. This
\nhow we are responding to you. We love you, Lord; we love you.<\/p>\n

Jesus then unfolds this spirit we are to have in three areas: giving,
\npraying, and fasting.<\/p>\n

Examine for a moment your giving, whether that is to the poor, or to
\nchurch, or to other charities. Far too many of us give because we are
\nasked. We seem to be blind when it comes to the needs of others. So we
\ndon’t give unless we are asked, and then, of course, we want to be thanked.
\nYou can walk into any major hospital or university building and find
\nthere the names of the major donors or donor.<\/p>\n

The church and all charities seem to have to beg us for gifts. We fail
\nto realize that all we have is a gift to us. Everything–starting from
\nlife itself to our external material possessions–is a gift to us from
\nGod. When we factor that into that our restored relationship with God
\nthrough Jesus, his presence in our lives constantly, his gift of eternal
\nlife, a sure hope that we will be taken by the hand and lead home as
\nwe travel this road on earth, we are rich, rich beyond what we think
\nand what we imagine.<\/p>\n

We need to respond to Jesus. And as he says at the very end of the Good
\nNews for this Ash Wednesday: where your treasure is, there your heart
\nwill be also.<\/p>\n

We know about the Grinch Who Stole Christmas, who had a heart 4 sizes
\ntoo small. Are we worse than the Grinch who takes but never gives, or
\ngives with great reluctance and with some kind of recognition necessary?<\/p>\n

I remind you of a man despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows
\nand acquainted with grief, a man beaten for our iniquities and whipped
\nfor our offenses, who gave up his life, so we could have his life. A
\nperson who has freely given us all things. Is our giving of what we have
\ngenerous, according to whose standing? Where is your heart? It is well
\nto examine our spirit of giving in this time of Lent.<\/p>\n

Have you ever seen a couple who are making every effort to show they
\nlove each other in public? They hang on each other like wet leaves on
\nconcrete. They kiss constantly, look fondly at each other, and stop and
\nembrace without thinking anybody is looking. Actually they are playing
\nto the crowd. They have no desire to be alone, for there is no audience
\nthere. In contrast, think of the husband and wife who deeply love each
\nother, but rarely show any sign of affection. Who are you when it comes
\nto giving?<\/p>\n

Our praying should not be acting. That is the meaning of being a hypocrite.
\nWe should not be playing to the crowds, or to other Christians. Only
\nacting, no truth at all. Some of the Pharisees at Jesus‘ time said that
\nthey would pray at certain hours of the day. Guess where they were when
\nthose times came? You guessed it. In the market place. Suddenly they
\nwould stop, and spend the next moments in prayer. They wanted to be seen,
\nJesus says, they were seen and that is their reward.<\/p>\n

When Jesus says we should not pray babbling on and on, it reminds me
\nthat some people just like to talk and they talk and talk and they talk.
\nToday we have prayer partners, prayer chains, and prayer warriors. Pray
\nin secret, not to be seen but to be heard by your heavenly Father. Pray
\nat all times, everwhere because you are praying in the secret of your
\nheart to God.<\/p>\n

Fasting is a little known among us, although it is coming into vogue
\nagain by some Christians. In a day when luxuries are considered necessities,
\nit would be of great benefit for us to understand what are necessities,
\nby giving up luxuries.<\/p>\n

Someone recently stated that there is a lot of fasting going on. It
\nis called dieting, and everyone is crowing about how they are dieting.
\nIs it to those people that Jesus is speaking perhaps?<\/p>\n

Dr. Martin Luther, talking about fasting in preparation for receiving
\nHoly Communion, says in his Small Catechism: „fasting and bodily
\npreparation are indeed a fine outward training, but he who is truly worthy
\nand well-prepared has faith in these words: given and shed for you for
\nthe forgiveness of sins.“<\/p>\n

Before we pass over this section where Jesus speaks about fasting, we
\nmight well consider how indulgent of ourselves we have become. We buy
\nanything we want, we eat anything we want, we go where ever we want,
\nwe buy more than we can use, we waste food at a phenomenal amount, our
\ngarages are filled to capacity, we need public storage, and we are all
\nguilty of conspicuous spending.<\/p>\n

Fasting aside, perhaps using less and giving more, praying with more
\ninsight into what we are praying for or about, or just praying a bit
\nmore is the spirit of Lent.<\/p>\n

A great Roman war hero was returning home. They were giving him one
\nof those triumphant marches we have seen so often in the movies or on
\nTV. Soldiers were lined along the streets to keep the masses from getting
\nin the way of the parade. A little boy tried to break through. A soldier
\ngot a good grip on him and said: „Don’t get in the way of the emperor.
\nThe boy replied, „He may be the emperor to you, but he is my father.“<\/p>\n

That is the spirit we should use in giving, praying and fasting. He,
\nour God is our Father, knowing all about us, caring for us deeply, wanting
\nto help us. Lent is the time we see him helping us more intimately, in
\nthe person of Jesus.<\/p>\n

It is that spirit that is the spirit of Lent. May it be ours as a gathering
\nof God’s people, and individually as persons brought with the precious
\nblood of God’s son, so we may always be in the presence of the supreme,
\nalmighty, ever living God. Amen.<\/p>\n

Walter W. Harms, retired pastor
\nAustin, TX, USA
\nComments? waltpasto@AOL.com<\/a> <\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Spirit of Lent Beauty is only skin deep, so the expression goes. I guess that is a warning to gullible men not to be attracted only to the outward beauty of a woman, but to look more closely at the inner, the spiritual beauty, if you wish, of a woman. I know that a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8543,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,727,108,110,362,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-9806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-matthaeus","category-archiv","category-current","category-engl","category-kapitel-06-chapter-06-matthaeus","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9806"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14058,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9806\/revisions\/14058"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9806"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=9806"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=9806"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=9806"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=9806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}