Holy Trinity Church

Anglican worship in Geneva

Ash Wednesday Sermon – Canon Alan Amos

In the name of God,  Father,  Son and life-giving Holy Spirit,  Amen

Text  : Make me a clean heart,  O God,  and renew a right spirit within me

Psalm 51 verse 11.

First a story.   This takes me back to the days of the civil war in Beirut,  when in 1977 there was a brief ceasefire which enabled some of us to gather for Ash Wednesday at All Saints Church.

With us was Clive Handford,   who was then the Dean of St. George’s Cathedral in Jerusalem, who was making a special visit to Beirut where he had formerly been chaplain.   Later Clive was to become bishop in Cyprus and the Gulf.

Clive and I and a few others had gathered early on Ash Wednesday to prepare the church for the service.   It was not possible to make a very good job of it,   as  during the fighting the church had been wrecked,  the altar smashed,  the pews and organ burnt.    But here we were together in church once again.  We began to talk about arrangements for the Ash Wednesday service,  which I was to lead as Chaplain.    Clive looked at me and said ,   “You know,  Alan,  I don’t think ashes will really be necessary.”   We looked around and came to an unspoken agreement.

And yet the service was beautiful and memorable,  and spoke to the few of us gathered there of the enduring love of God,   of hope,  and the possibility of renewal.   It was several years before  the church could be used again;  and even now  Beirut and Lebanon is afflicted by a number of disasters.

Clare and I hope to get back there for a visit later this year,  in response to an invitation from the congregation who are hoping for the eventual appointment of a new chaplain,  after what will have been a very lengthy interregnum .

To ash,  or not to ash,  that is the question.    Or as the book of Ecclesiastes puts it :  To everything there is a season,  and a time to every purpose under heaven :   a time to weep,  and a time to laugh,  a time to mourn, and a time to dance,   a time to cast away stones,  and a time to gather stones together.  

I believe the time that is given to us today is one where we are called  to turn to God for forgiveness,  cleansing and renewal;   but with the Covid virus still pressing hard around us,   I venture to suggest we have no urgent need of ashing.   The reminders of our mortality are ever present.

Rather than “do it yourself”  ashing,   I therefore suggest the use of water today,  which recalls our baptism  and can be a sign of our longing for cleansing and renewal.  There will be a place for that very shortly in our Liturgy of Penitence for this special day which begins our observance of Lent.

And what of Lent itself ?    As I look out into our garden,  I see that the first daffodils have come out,  as heralds of a Spring which is still a month away,  but is showing its advance guard in the swelling of buds and the rising of hyacinths.    Let our Lent this year be for us a season of  spring-cleaning in advance of Spring –  of chasing away all that gloom threatened in our first reading from Joel,  but which the good Lord in his mercy may replace with a blessing.   For does not the first Epistle of St. John assure us  “this is the message which we have heard from Jesus Christ ,  and which we announce to you :  that God is light,  and in him is no darkness at all.”

And so let us live and rejoice in that light,  fling back the curtains,  open the windows,  let the light that banishes darkness flood  into our souls,   so that we may not be people of gloom,  but people who know the joy of repentance that leads to deeper faith and to celebration.

What can teach us to do this better than the Psalms.  We began our worship with a paraphrase of the 23rd Psalm,  which speaks of God’s care for us at all times,   and then,  as we listened to the magnificent setting of psalm 51 by Allegri,    sung beautifully by our virtual choir,  we heard the voices which call out  “ Make me a clean heart O God,  and renew a right spirit within me ! 

And “ give me again the joy of your salvation,  and sustain me with your gracious spirit. “

Let us then make our Lent a time of repentance,  thanksgiving and through God’s grace a time of renewal,  for us as individuals and as community.  

So that we may rejoice in the light of Christ,  and know the God in whom there is no darkness at all. And so we come to our Liturgy of Penance as a kind of rite of passage,   a means of leading us out of the land of shadows,   into the full light of Christ,  into the promised land to which we truly belong. The land in which we will be nourished by the true manna,  the food which turns our wilderness into the paradise of God,    as we make our spiritual communion this day.