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I will admit that when I first attended MCC, I felt pretty intimidated by what seemed like a multitude of liturgical seasons, each marked by its own unique color.
Coming from a Southern Baptist background, I didn't know much about any of the seasons except the bare basics.
All I knew about the Season of Lent, for instance, was you were expected to give up something for a few weeks.
My childhood playmates usually let go of things like chocolate or bubble gum. And because, in my adolescent way of thinking,
these so-called sacrifices were superficial and temporary, I ignorantly felt entitled to my childhood weapons of scorn and ridicule –
weapons which many so-called "people of faith" continue to brandish, even as adults.
But as I have come to appreciate the ebb and flow of the church’s liturgical seasons,
I’ve also come to realize there is real value in the spiritual spring cleaning which occurs about this time each year.
We could all do with a bit of letting go of some things in our lives, while embracing other things – even if it's for just a few weeks.
So on this First Sunday of Lent, I invite you to join me in letting go of the past and embracing the future –
something I believe this morning’s scripture reading beautifully illustrates. Today's story of God’s rainbow covenant
was recorded by the exiled people of Israel, trapped as they were, in the painful present day of their captors,
and aching for the glory days of their past. And so, for these people, it was a story which pointed them to a future of hope.
In the story, Noah and his family had managed to survive the devastation of the flood which was intended to wipe out evil and wickedness once and for all.
It was a story that began with God’s regret and grief over the wickedness that was said to be "great in the earth."
Drastic times call for drastic measures. And although an antediluvian flood to wipe out the source of wickedness is certainly drastic enough,
it didn't seem to do the trick. Within a very short time, humanity had returned to its old ways of wickedness, marked by violence, greed, and the inequity of resources –
something that continues to this day. Although it seemed like a good idea at the moment, the flood never accomplished what scripture says was its intent.
It's a lesson that humankind still hasn't managed to learn. We still try to destroy evil with our own force and violence.
But peace never lasts for long. Before you know it, wickedness, as we know it, rears its ugly head somewhere else – sometimes even within our own ranks.
God broke the cycle of violence with this morning's covenant. However, the image of God within our scripture was not a divine image that the ancient world would have been familiar with.
Most of us, perhaps lulled by pictures of Jesus with the children around him, simply assume God’s kindly, even somewhat permissive, merciful, and forgiving nature.
But the ancient world had a keen sense of both God's omnipotence and God's justice.
The one who created all things also stood as judge over all things and was entitled to destroy all things when they proved so disappointing.
This morning's radically different image of a merciful God, a God who promised to refrain from destructive activities,
even if the other partner of the covenant didn't, would have even appeared to be a weak God to some of the ancients.
To forgo for all time the right to destroy was an unheard-of surrendering of divine power.
And so with this morning’s covenant, God was no longer only the creator, but also the protector of all creation,
committed to refraining from the punishment of humanity or the destruction of the world.
And so this morning's story provides an image of a God who changes tactics, letting go of old ways of doing things and making a commitment to new, nonviolent ways –
even if humanity continued its downward spiral of violence, greed, and wickedness.
God let go of punishment for past deeds and embraced mercy and grace as a mode of operation for the future.
And as a celestial memory aid, God pledged to set in gathering clouds God's war bow,
unstrung, and pointing away from earth, where God said, "I will see it and remember" the covenant.
And so, if God was willing to embrace a new way of being in relationship, then why not us?
And what better time to begin practicing this new way than today? Many of us are inclined to allow the past to control much of our lives.
We live in shame that has been heaped upon us by our families, faith communities, and well-intentioned peers.
Shame for who we are, what we believe, and who we love. Shame, rooted in our childhood and adolescence, forcing us to live out our lives, imprisoned
by fear of persecution, abandonment, and rejection. We have endured spiritual abuse from others
and we reinforce that violence to our own spirits when we allow the messages of shame and fear from our past control our lives today.
What would life be like if, like God in this morning's scripture reading, we made a commitment,
a covenant to ourselves to let go of the violent ways of shame and embraced a new and redemptive way of grace and mercy?
What would life be like if, we let go of the messages of our past – messages which emphasize our unworthiness, our inability to ever be good enough for God –
and instead, embraced a new message for the future – a message that we are God's beloved children,
that we are part of God's masterpiece that God proclaimed at the very outset of creation to be "very good"?
And what would life be like if we made a covenant to no longer allow violence be done to our spirits,
even if other people refused to participate in that covenant? But we are in relationship with more than just ourselves, aren't we?
We are also in relationship with others, and the past controls that relationship, too.
Just as we allow the shame of our past to control our relationship with our own spirits, we also allow resentments and grudges from our past control our relationship with other people.
We firmly clench within our hands the many wrong things that have been done to us. And we use this as our self-righteous justification for the thoughts, words, and actions
that we hurl at our adversaries. And the sad fact is we are just as imprisoned by our own resentment of others
as the person who is imprisoned by fear and shame. And "when harboring such feeling[s], we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit."
We must let go of the resentments of others, for if we don't, our spirits will die of our own poison.
If God, our heavenly creator and protector, has refused to use violence as a means of our punishment,
even if we continue in our own self-destructive ways, then we are obliged to do the same for others.
We must commit ourselves to refraining from revenge if we ever expect to live in a future of hope and freedom.
God entered into a genuine relationship with humanity and is therefore now subject to the hope and disappointment, joy and grief that attend all relationships.
And we must be willing to do no less. Letting go of the past and embracing the future is the first step in our Lenten journey.
It’s a long journey, of course – one that begins in Lent, passes through the passion and the cross,
and ends up somewhere on this side of the resurrection – but it’s a journey worth taking, and today is a good day to get walking. Amen.