The Heart Set on God (Joel 2:1-2, 12-17; Matthew 6)
Rob Tennant, HillSong Church, Chapel Hill, NC
February 18, 2015 - Ash Wednesday
God is quite clear.
“Even now, says the Lord, return to me with all you heart”. The prophet gives us God’s appeal in Joel
chapter 2. Return to God with all of our
heart. God wants the deepest parts of
us. God wants every part of every one of
us.
Ancient Israelites recognized that
sin grieves God and so their repentance, their turning from sin back to god,
was emotional and demonstrative. They
did not simply close their eyes and bow their heads and say, “Oh God, I am so
sorry I sinned. Please forgive me.” They went beyond a simple spoken prayer.
They would fast. We see King David do this after he has an
affair with Bathsheba. The prophet
Nathan tells him God is going to punish him for his adultery and the murder of
Bathsheba’s husband Uriah. So David goes
through the grief and repentance rituals.
Second Samuel 12:16 says he laid awake all night praying. He fasted and even when his attendants urged
him to eat he would not. For an entire week, he maintained his vigil before
God.
Other passages tell of the ancients rustling
their hair and beard so that they are disheveled. They tear their garments and throw ashes on
their heads. They go many days without
bathing, without eating, and in a state of disarray. This is a lot more than the eye closed, head
bowed, O God, I am so sorry, and then
the prayer and repentance is over. The
ritual was involved. In ancient Israel,
turning to God away from sin demanded a lot from the one doing the confessing
and repenting.
Unfortunately, by the time Joel was
inspired to speak as God’s prophet, the people had become quite skilled in the
grief and repentance rituals. They were
practiced at putting on the whole show of sorrow for their sins. But when the show was over, they went right
back to their sins.
The original intent of the ritual
was not a case of God making people jump through hoops to earn God’s
favor. The fasting, the tearing of one’s
garments, the tussling of one’ hair, the shower of ash, the marathon sessions
of prayer, confession, and lament – all of it was supposed to be an outward
sign of one’s inner sorrow. All this
demonstrative ritual was meant to show that the people understood how badly
their own sins wounded them. Our sin
stands between us and right relationship with God.
I know sin is a trite word in
popular culture. Popular music groups
sing about sin as if it is fun. People
will giggle at pastors who rail against the damage sin does. Rarely do I hear people, when they talk about
wanting to make changes in their lives, grieve how their sins injure their
relationship with God. Most people
identify themselves as “good people.” I am good a person. It’s not like I have killed anyone or stolen
anything. Few people accept that
they are sinners and those who do shrug it off.
Everyone is a sinner so even
admitting it we actually tell ourselves we’re
not that bad.
God hates sin because every sin, big
and small, is a choice to do things in a way other than God’s way. Sin is the decision that God’s way is not the
best. Other ways are better. But that is not true.
Outside
of God, all ways of living lead to eternal death. In the cross of Christ, God has made a way for
sin to be covered and removed. It is no
longer an obstacle between us and Him.
But just as God did not want the empty ritual Joel rejected, God does
not want us to disobey him and then confess with no intention of ever stopping
ungodly thoughts, words, and deeds.
Yes, we should specifically name our
sins and confess them to the Lord. Yes,
we should receive the forgiveness God gives.
And our confession should be more than words we speak. Our confession, when it is real, is an
expression of something happening in our hearts. Joel 2:12, “Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with
mourning; rend your hearts and not your clothing.”
The
changed heart leads to a new life. Can
we hear Joel’s call to “rend our hearts”?
We look inside, see that sin has corrupted us, and we rip ourselves open
so we are completely exposed before God, broken and sorry. God receives us with love, patience, and
grace. Joel’s very next line shows where
repentance leads. “Return to the Lord, your
God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast
love, and relents from punishing.”
The
rooting out of sin and the replacing of it with gentleness, patience, self-control,
joy, unity, peace, and love is something God does, not us. We cannot accomplish the change of
heart. What can do is position ourselves
before God, humble and open to whatever God has in store. We set ourselves so that we are available for
God to go to work in us. When we rend
our hearts, confess our sin, rip ourselves open, and break ourselves down and
lay ourselves out before the Lord, we discover how truly gracious God is. We become new creations.
Jesus
identifies steps his disciples take in setting their hearts on God. Matthew chapter 6 is the middle portion of
Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The entirety
of chapters 5, 6, & 7 is him speaking.
In chapter 6, Jesus says what he assumes his followers will do. “Whenever you give alms” (a charitable gift),
Jesus says, “do not let your left your hand know what your right hand is doing”
(6:3). He does not say “if you give,”
but rather, “when you give.” Jesus
assumes his disciples will give what they can to help people in need, and he
wants them to do this in secret as an act done toward God, for God’s
pleasure.
The same pattern persists
for the other disciplines Jesus mentions.
He says, “When you pray,” and “when you fast.” In both cases, Jesus rejects those who carry
out these practices to call attention to their own righteousness. ‘Hypocrites’ Matthew writes (6:2), practice
the disciplines in full view of everyone because they gain some kind of
religious ‘street cred.’ Jesus expects
his followers to fast, pray, and give, and he expects us to do these things in
private as acts of humility before God.
These are not to be burdens, loads that make our lives difficult.
It is just the
opposite. Just as Joel tells us to rip open
our heart not so we will be punished but so we will experience God’s grace,
Jesus says that when we give, fast, and pray we are in fact storing up
treasures (6:19-20). In these practices,
we become malleable in God’s hands, available to be shaped by His love and
truth. The prayer of confession shows that
we know we need forgiveness. The fast of
going without food or limiting our diets to simple foods shows that we know how
weak we are before our appetites. Our cravings
drive us to selfish overindulgence and fasting combats that. Giving generously
shows that money is just a tool and tools are to convey God’s blessing on all
people, not just one.
If we live in these
spiritual disciplines, we have to submit ourselves to Jesus as Lord. If we practice the disciplines without
turning to Him, we will either be miserable, or we will be proud of our own
self-control and the pride will lead us into other sins, or else we cheat and not
keep the commitment and then justify our actions. In that way, we close our hearts off and lock
God out.
Take fasting as an easy
example. Nothing spiritual is gained by
not eating meat for 40 days. It could
potentially make the person doing it crabby and he might justify grabbing a
chicken wing by saying, it will make him more pleasant. He’ll claim the practice or spiritual
discipline isn’t working and in order to be a better person, he needs to cheat
or to quit. Or, he’ll say, “I’m only
human,” and he gives up. I know this is all true because I have failed in the
disciplines in just the way I am describing here. Either by force of will we maintain the fast
but bitterness grows in us or we caves in and feeds our appetites. What really needs feeding is our spirit.
When we fast, say go
without lunch for 40 days, no eating between 8AM and 6PM, and in weak moments
we are tempted, it is then that we turn in absolute dependence to Jesus. That’s why we fast. We see that our lives cannot go on, not if we
are “in Christ,” except by relying on God through prayer. We could live apart from Christ, but that
would be life apart from God, life on our own strength. The practice of disciplines reveals how
little strength we have. So we lift up
desperate deep heart prayers. If the
fast is leading us to dark thoughts or anger, we get away from people and take our
struggle right to God in private. There,
open and exposed, we wait and God begins healing and renewing. When we get back around others, after God has
done his work, we are cheerful and joy-filled.
I know Lent is about
spiritual renewal – people giving up some sort of of pleasure in order to focus
on faith. That’s the way we say it. I think the real heart of this season is God
doing what God does. God achieves God’s
purposes in the lives of those of his followers who set themselves before him
and open themselves to him. That is why we pray, give, and fast.
I won’t get to preach
this Ash Wednesday sermon this year. Our
service has been snowed out. If I had
been able to do it, I would have designated the final portion of the message to
presenting a challenge to the church. I
hope everyone who reads this will consider what it means to give one’s life
completely to Jesus and to live every moment under Jesus’ reign, and will take
up the challenged offered here.
First, we give God what
God really wants. As Joel says, we do
not rip our clothes in a show of repentance.
We rip our hearts so that we are truly ready to be changed. How? One
way (certainly not the only way) is an intense, 40-day commitment to spiritual
disciplines.
So, second, we pray,
give, and fast. And we do so as a way of
recognizing our need and allowing that need to force us to turn to God as we experience
God in the Holy Spirit. I am going to do
all three and I am not going to announce how I do any of the three. In the spirit of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew
9, I am going practice my disciplines ‘in secret.’ My wife knows what I am doing. She is my most trusted prayer partner and
also the person who prepares many of my meals.
(As an aside, I would gladly cook for her but she has no interest in my
culinary skills). Other than her, it is
God an me in this together.
This is the invitation to
you. Take up the disciplines as a way of
turning your heart to God. The rending
of the heart: this is the work of Jesus followers year-round, but with a unique
seriousness and at the same time a heightened joy in the weeks and days leading
up to Easter.
If guidance in
spiritually disciplined living is a help, I offer this. Write the following sentence down:
I need my heart to be __________ by God.
Maybe you need your heart
broken by God. Maybe you need
your heart healed. Here are some
other options.
-
Inspired.
-
Enlightened.
-
Provoked or prodded.
Of
course you may think up your own need.
Or, you may first need to ask God to show you how you need Him to be at
work in your life. I promise this. If you commit to prayer, fasting, and giving
from now until Easter and you keep the commitment, you will meet God. This is not because these disciplines have
any control over what does. Notice I did
not say doing these things will determine how we meet God. We cannot influence God’s actions. The disciplines affect us and change us and
set us. We are set to see God – the God
who is always present. The disciplines break
open our eyes and ears so we can see and the one who loves us.
So,
write the sentence down, stick the paper in your Bible and go to it every day. Renew your commitment daily. I need
my heart to be formed by God. I need my
heart to be resurrected by God. I need my
heart to be softened by God. Every
day from now until Easter Sunday make this prayer a part of your daily Bible
reading and moment-by-moment practice of spiritual disciplines.
God
is pretty straightforward. He wants our
hearts. In Lent 2015, why don’t we give
Him what he wants?
