TAKE OFF YOUR MASK
February 25, 2007
sermon given at St. Thomas Episcopal Church,
Medina, Washington
Did you notice? Do you see the difference? There was no procession this morning. The baptismal font is dry. The hymns are a cappella. The green has given way to purple. The mood is somber—not joyless, but serious, intense. At the beginning of this service, we publicly confessed our sins, something we don’t do every week at St. Thomas. It’s time to examine ourselves, so that when we take off our masks, we will have some idea of what God sees. It’s time to be accountable to each other as well. Jesus has entered the desert, and we are going with him. We have entered the season of Lent.
Last Tuesday, we threw a Mardi Gras party and cut loose to Dixieland music. We created masks to cover our faces. We decorated a scroll with the word “Alleluia.” And then we took that word of praise and buried it in a grave next to the bell tower.
Then, on Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, we took off our masks. Lent begins with an episode of vulnerability: we have ashes imposed on our foreheads. To do this is to publicly admit that we will die someday. On Wednesday, we admitted our humanity to everybody present. Not everyone who attended the service was ready to do it … so they didn’t.
In five and a half weeks, Lent will end with an episode of vulnerability: on Maundy Thursday, we will wash each other’s feet. In our culture, it’s OK to be barefoot in public, but not in every place. It’s as much nakedness as we can reasonably deal with among strangers, and some people even have a hard time with that much. To remove our shoes is to be vulnerable, and to be vulnerable is to admit our humanity. Not everybody who attends the Maundy Thursday service will be ready to do it … so they won’t.
Between now and then, two of our members, Sophie and Amy, will prepare for baptism at the Easter Vigil, the event that we also call the Crown of the Year. On that night, April 7, we will dig up the Alleluia scroll. We will gather in the darkness—men, women, newcomers, old hands, teenagers, babies in pajamas staying up way past their bedtime—and together, we will light the new Paschal flame. Illuminated by candlelight, we will hear the story of our faith. And then, as our forty days in the desert draw to a close, we will accompany Sophie and Amy to the water.
But why are these two coming to the water? What does baptism do, anyway? In his booklet “Holy Baptism: A Guide for Parents and Godparents,” theologian John Westerhoff writes: “Baptism is a sacrament, not magic. The purpose of a sacrament is to make us aware of a truth that is not self-evident so that we might benefit from it. Sacraments are symbolic, ritual acts of revelation. Magical acts, on the other hand, are intended to acquire something we would not otherwise be able to possess. Magic, for example, would be an action performed to convince God to do something God would not do without our convincing.”
There’s a persistent idea out there that we baptize people in order to make God save them from hell. I wish I knew where this idea comes from … and how to get rid of it. I can’t think of anything more damaging to a person’s perception of God than to be told that eternal damnation awaits those who don’t have a little water put on their foreheads. This is magical thinking, not sacramental. It turns God into a vending machine: insert water, receive salvation.
The vending machine model has never been believed by any good theologian, going all the way back to the early church. Even during the Middle Ages, when the church was notoriously guilty of superstitious thinking, the concept of Limbo arose as a haven for unbaptized babies. And the current Pope says he deems the concept of Limbo unnecessary. But if the situation isn’t so dire, then why baptize at all?
The simple answer is that God doesn’t need baptism—we do. God loves each and every one of us unconditionally, and that’s difficult to believe. It’s a little like trying to imagine infinity. God loves us in a way we can’t earn … that we don’t deserve … and that we can never be apart from.
Unfortunately, many people go through life unaware of this boundless love, or actively refusing to believe it. The circumstances of our lives so often work against this belief. Some people have had such painful experiences that they can’t possibly imagine being unconditionally loved by anyone. In fact, I bet most of us have felt this way from time to time. Do you worry that God might not think you’re good enough? Let go of your fear. You don’t have to be good enough.
On the other hand, do you believe you don’t need God—that you really are a good enough person just as you are? Sorry—you’re not that great. And no number of good deeds can possibly earn unconditional love … but it’s there for you anyway.
Do you worry that you might have done something so bad, so wrong, that God has stopped loving you? Let go of your guilt. In today’s epistle, Paul writes, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Be free! Then your efforts to be a good person can come from a place of gratitude—not fear.
This kind of love is so hard to believe that we need to engage in a public ritual—a sacrament—to even begin to grasp what’s going on here. Jesus himself was baptized, so we are, too. We want to show everybody that God washes away all our sins, all our guilt, all the things that ever come between us and God’s love. God loves us, knows us, feeds us, forgives us, and is always with us.
Some Christians worry that believing God’s love to be unconditional means that we don’t believe in judgment. Oh, no – judgment will come. The mistake is to associate judgment with mere punishment. Parents: when you punish your child, do you do it out of anger, in order to inflict pain? I hope not! Punishing a child may hurt, but it is meant to inspire growth. Although I shudder at the thought, I want God to judge my actions. When I am aware of my sin, I want to confess it so that God can see I take it seriously. Loving judgment flows from God perpetually, and it’s up to me to learn from it.
So here we are in Lent. For forty days, we will mute our joy and listen for God’s judging voice—and in that judging, we will listen for a joy even deeper than we imagined before. We will undertake self-discipline and prayer. It’s time to do our spring cleaning, clearing out the cobwebs in our minds, scrubbing the dingy corners of our hearts … and, above all, removing our masks so God can see us just as we are. We are so serious about God’s love that we will do everything we can to be worthy of it, knowing all along that we can’t ever be worthy of it. Yet what response could be more sincere than to keep practicing?
Everything we do here is an open invitation. Come to the water. Come to the table. Come join our family. Come dance and play with God. Come be friends with God; God is already friends with you. Come let God love you more deeply than even your parents ever could … to infinity and beyond!
These are not demands, and they are not requirements. We do it this way because this is how we perceive God at work in the world: inviting, but not forcing. We always have the free will to accept the invitation or refuse it.
God hopes we will use our free will to help reconcile this fallen world. We hope that you will join us in the reconciliation work we attempt at St. Thomas. Maybe you’re not ready, but we’re inviting you anyway. Take off your mask. Take off your shoes. Be vulnerable. Not everybody will choose vulnerability … but the invitation stands.
We are Christians. Lent and Easter are our story. Come tell the story with us.