Ash Wednesday 2013 (Matthew6:1-6;16-21)

“Where your treasure is there will your heart be also.”

What do you treasure?

What is your bottom line value that you will not surrender and for which you are willing to make sacrifices?

What you treasure defines who you are becoming. What you value creates your destiny.

Based on observation, many- perhaps most- people in our world answer that question in one word: money. Oh, that isn’t what people generally say with words. There is still some sense of the Divine Pattern in human consciousness that people will generally say what we think we should say. Our actions tell a different story. Our actions speak louder than our words.

Our Heavenly Father knows this about us. Jesus experienced this aspect of human nature. He witnessed the religious hypocrisy of people. He observed how people performed the outward and visible acts of religious devotion but rejected the inward and spiritual reality of religious devotion.

Prayer, fasting, Bible study, worship, charity are all good actions in and of themselves. Moses and the prophets observed how people can and do perform the acts from the place of fear, self- will and pride rather than from the place of faith, hope and love.

What difference does it make? Jesus tells us very clearly, concisely and bluntly. Where your treasure is- what your bottom line value is- forms your heart, your mind, your soul.

The pain of original separation distorts our minds, hearts and wills. Those distortions subvert and corrupt the original virtues with which God anointed our souls. Sin is the result. In the gospel reading today Jesus addresses the sin of religious hypocrisy. He is not addressing secular people who have rejected religion. He is addressing religious people who hold the forms of religion as a mask to hide their own separation from God.

During this holy season of Lent, Jesus invites us to consider what we value most. Where is our priority? What is our bottom line?

The standard is love. The original blessing of God is the threefold pattern of love that manifests through our relationships. The prime relationship is our friendship with the Son, Jesus Christ. The outward and visible manifestation of this value is worship, The inward and spiritual grace is the Real Presence of Jesus in our minds, hearts and wills.

The secondary relationship is revealed in how we treat others and in how we set our priorities in life. Do we seek to practice compassion?  Do we seek to grow in grace and transform our attitudes and actions in grace?

The Holy Spirit stands ready to reveal to us where we live with religious hypocrisy. He will, if we ask, help us to discern where we need to reset our priorities according to the Original Blessing. And, He will transform particular sin back into its original virtue as we surrender self-will to divine will.

To keep a holy Lent is to ask the Holy Spirit to give us the courage to acknowledge where we are in distortion. To keep a holy Lent is to ask the Holy Spirit to show us what steps we can take to participate in the transformation of our hearts, our deepest and defining desires. To keep a holy Lent is to make a sincere pledge to hear the word of God, believe the Word of God, and act on the Word of God. For, where your treasure is, where your bottom line value is, there will your heart be also- there will you set your path in this life and in the life of the worl