Ash Wednesday: February 14, 2024

Every once in awhile, the pool of water near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem, known as the pool of Bethesda, would be disturbed.  The waters would bubble and swirl and when that happened - the people thought an angel of God was troubling those waters - and the first person, and only the first person -  into the pool as the water was swirling - would receive the touch of God and they would be healed.
    In the shade of one of the porches surrounding those waters, laid a man who had been sick for 38 years - and from the details of the Gospel of John, we assume he was lame or paralyzed – because he was not able to get up and get to the waters before anyone else.
    And while we don’t know how long he had been lying in the courtyard, the sense we get is that he had been there for quite some time.  So when Jesus comes along, he knows this man has been lying near the waters for awhile, but never getting in them – and asks the man what seems like an absurd question – do you want to be healed?
    I think it is strange to ask the man if he wants to get well – but maybe it’s not so strange – because if this man REALLY wanted to be healed - you think he would have found some way of getting into the waters first. . .
    He could have asked someone for help to get him to the waters as soon as they were stirred – 
he could have stayed right at the edge of the pool and just rolled himself in when the waters were troubled - he could have set up some type of numbering system where people didn’t push and shove others out of the way, but simply waited their turn.
    One would think there would have been some way, after all these years - to get in before anyone else did — assuming the man really wanted to be healed.  Maybe he had grown comfortable with his situation.  Maybe he had given up hope.  Or may he just did not care anymore.
    Notice the man never gives Jesus an answer ot his question  – but just complains about how he can never get to the water first.
    A friend in seminary, when we studied St. John’s Gospel, called this Jesus’ miracle of healing the whiner - because that’s what the man did.  You would think he would shout out enthusiastically:  yes!  I want to be healed.  But that’s not what he did – he just whined out his excuses. . .
    I am glad Jesus did heal the whiner – because at times, aren’t we all just a little bit of a whiner??
    We make excuses as to why we can’t come to church more often, or how we don’t have the time to pray or read the Bible, or to be more involved in the life of the faith community.  Or that money is so tight we can’t possibly help anyone but ourselves. . .
    But in the midst of our whining and in the midst of our complacency, the good news is that Jesus still comes along and asks:  do you want to be healed?
    Let me ask Jesus’ question in other ways:  do we want to grow in our faith?  Do we want to get closer to God?  Do we want to experience more of God’s power, more of God’s presence, more of God’s truth, more of God’s love?

    Then today is a day for us to shout enthusiastically:  YES! I want to be healed!

    Because the season of Lent is all about growing in our faith.  Lent is not just about giving up chocolate or coffee for 40 days.  
It’s not just about eating fish on Fridays or attending a pancake breakfast on Mardi Gras.
These are meant to be only a means to an end:
growing deeper in our faith.  And it’s about being made well.  It’s about – getting out of our paralysis and walking more faithfully with Christ.
    So I think today Jesus is right here asking each of us – as we ash distributors will say in a few minutes - do you want to be healed?  And about us saying YES!

    Now there’s a difference between the man at the pool of Bethesda and us.  Jesus just had to say to the man:  rise, take up your mat, and walk.
And it happened.
    For us, it will take a little more effort and a bigger commitment.  For most of us, we are going to be healed and we are going to grow in our faith when we venture from the safety of the side of the pool into the stirred up waters of life.  
    We will deepen our faith and trust when we are willing to get up out of our comfort and ease and allow our lives and our faith to be disturbed - with a little prayer, a little fasting, and a little almsgiving:  to help stir the waters of our souls.
    Because I think way too many of us have become like the paralytic – we’ve grown so comfortable with our lives and our faith just the way they are – and we don’t even see the need or have the desire to change.
    I think sometimes we have become so complacent, that we don’t even see our sins–
 or our need for Jesus to heal us.
    And that’s why I am inviting you to pray as often as you can – ideally every day - the prayer that was in the bulletin this past Sunday – and is also available by the doors as you leave today.
    It’s a prayer attributed to Sir Francis Drake and was written in 1577.  I think it is a powerful prayer – and that there is power in all of us praying this for ourselves and for the members of our faith community throughout Lent.  This is the prayer:


    Disturb us, Lord, when we are too pleased with ourselves – when our dreams have come true because we dreamed too little - when we arrive safely because we sailed too close to the shore.
    Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess we have lost our thirst for the waters of life. And  having fallen in love with life, we have ceased to dream of eternity.  And in our efforts to build a new earth - we have allowed our vision of the new heaven to dim.
    Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly.  To venture on wilder seas where storms will show us your mastery.

    Where long losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.  We ask you to push back the horizons of our hopes; and to push back the future in strength, hope, and love.  This we ask in the name of our Captain, who is Jesus Christ.

    Pray this prayer often during Lent for yourself and for this whole faith community

AND THEN:
    
    Dare to be disturbed this Lent.
    

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