Good Shepherd Good Sheep

“What It Is to Be Penitent”

Joel 2:12-19

2 Corinthians 5:20b—6:10

Psalm 6

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

Midweek Lent – Ash Wednesday

During our Lenten season, we’ll discuss-through what’s called the 7 penitential psalms. The first one is number 6, and I ask you to turn to it (it’s in the front of your hymnal, so follow it as I read it and, then, discuss through it a bit):

6 O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger,
nor discipline me in your wrath.
2 Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing;
heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled.
3 My soul also is greatly troubled.
But you, O Lord—how long?

4 Turn, O Lord, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
5 For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?

6 I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
7 My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.

8 Depart from me, all you workers of evil,
for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.
9 The Lord has heard my plea;
the Lord accepts my prayer.
10 All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled;
they shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment.

In the name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Bridge

In the movie “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade”, Harrison Ford’s character and his dad were in search of the Holy Grail (the chalice Jesus used when He instituted His Holy Supper). After traveling from the U.S. to Italy, Germany, then through the Middle East, they (in the movie) arrived at a hidden monastery and encountered (there) 3 challenges to get to the Grail. The first was to understand the meaning of the clue: “Only the penitent man will pass” and, after other hunters lost their heads trying to pass unprepared, Indiana Jones decided that it was a kneeling man, only, who could pass the deadly traps that got set. A penitent man kneels (that’s true); but that kneeling is misunderstood if it’s, only, a physical act. Real penitence may get expressed physically, but it’s not an act, it’s an attitude (one of a “broken and contrite heart” which God says He “will not despise”). Tonight we get reminded of what I think is a tragically almost lost art called penitence … and our topic is “What is it to be penitent?”

Text

And for that, Psalm 6 begins the journey. The destiny’s going to be for us, also, the Holy Grail … Psalms 6, 32, 38, 51, 102, 130, and, then, 143 will take us to Maundy Thursday’s chalice and the betrayal of Jesus to death. Psalm 6 describes “What a Penitent is”, breaking-down the topic into 4 parts. So we’re going to take each, starting with verses 1 through 3:

Being a Penitent starts with deciding before-Whom one kneels. “O Lord”, the psalmist decided. He, both, knew to-Whom He should kneel and knew that this One would hear him and care that he knelt. Penitence begins with the fear, love, and trust particularly in the Lord, Who is God … the writer, here, started by acknowledging the audience in God before doing anything else. A penitent can’t proceed with requesting anything without knowing it’s Him Who can help (being aware of how far we are, naturally, beneath Him Who can effect change in forgiveness and grace … hope.

“O Lord” … “I, under Your Lordship” … beg that You “not rebuke me in Your anger, nor discipline me in Your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing; heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is greatly troubled. But You, O Lord—how long?” God “rebukes”, or “disciplines”, people for two very different reasons. One is in judgment, where people get it not as the temporary chastisement of a loving Father, but as the inevitable end of their own ways. A Penitent’s first request is that any earthly trials are within a favorable relationship to God’s grace rather than as His just-response to one who’s outside of relationship. Another way a believer might put this is, still begging for mercy, being privileged to request of Him as “Our Father”.

Everything, here, demands the knowledge of God and the knowledge of us who aren’t, obviously, God. One with the attitude that “He-is-God-and-I-am-not-yet-I-know-Him-merciful-for-Jesus’-sake” hopes for a forgiveness offered under condition of penitence and faith. In this first section, a Penitent’s body and soul mourn because of the separation our sin causes between us and the One we want to know, fully, as Dad.

Paganism neither knows sin nor knows God. And, even, while Christians of the Middle Ages seemed strikingly aware of sin, many may have lacked the sense, really, of a merciful God. Today (while the Good News of God might be better known) sin’s forgotten or rationalized. Conscience has been dulled considerably over the centuries because civilization considers itself smarter and more-capable. Maybe (in reality) the more we know, the less we, really, know. Psychology, often, glosses over the fact of failure, and self-esteem gets medicated-in by, just, suggestions to “look on a bright side of things”.

But Scripture says that when we acknowledge our weakness, God delivers His strength. “My bones are troubled”, the Psalm says. “My soul is greatly troubled”. “I am languishing” … and a believer always knows that a potential heavenly penalty pains as nothing here ever could. St. Augustine said, “O God, bear down on me here … strike me here … beat me here; but please spare me in the life hereafter”.

The next section (verses 4 and 5) say:

4 Turn, O Lord, deliver my life;
save me for the sake of your steadfast love.
5 For in death there is no remembrance of you;
in Sheol who will give you praise?

Being spared for the life hereafter, that’s salvation, and the Penitent knows it as such. Beyond the ashes of earthly decay, Penitents know that Sheol (or Hell) will give no opportunity for, even, a hint of God and that the Sheol which sin deserves is never averted by ignoring its effect. “Turn from Your most-appropriate anger, O Lord, and deliver my life from what I’m due, saving me for the sake of Your steadfast love (which is my only chance)”.

And this next section (verses 6 and 7) shows how Hell tempts from such an appropriate despair (ignoring grief / never saying such words). But the Penitent knows it well, so does:

6 I am weary with my moaning;
every night I flood my bed with tears;
I drench my couch with my weeping.
7 My eye wastes away because of grief;
it grows weak because of all my foes.

If we do not return to the Gospel, the tearful flood of this life will give way to the same (and more) in the next. But here’s where God takes action for a Penitent: “While we were, yet, sinners, Christ died for us”. “Jesus came to save sinners”.

Tears of “moaning” turn to joyful tears when one receives the Gospel like a cool glass of water from the midst of scorching heat (that’s the other part of being a Penitent). Martin Luther says that the urge for this Gospel (upon rightful despair of sin) is nothing short of “being a Christian”. Psalm 42 describes a hunted dear burning in the heat with thirst: “as a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for You, O God”. In this manner does a true believer yearn anxiously and tremblingly for God’s Word of forgiveness and hope. With such a desire and love for that, Luther says that people (that way) would “come and run after God’s Church to receive it (so much so that, even, the priests who dispense it beg for Divine energy to bestow-it fast enough”).

So, now, the last glorious section (verses 8 to 10):

And the Penitent cries “Amen, Lord” to that. “You, Lord, can deliver from evil” (even from within). Both saving forgiveness and the ability to cast temptation aside can be accomplished anew by God for a Penitent / one repenting. Confidence, having traveled through the storm of daily repentance and into reinstatement-with-joy is the gift of one who despairs over sin yet trusts in God for deliverance. Both constitute life under God.

May this be us, now and always, through +Jesus Christ, and for His sake. Amen.