The Meaning of Ash Wednesday

 Proverbs 28:13

The month of September is the holiest time of the year for Jews. That’s when they usually celebrate the New Year which is called Rosh Hashanah.

And then, there are ten days of self examination. During this time you look at your life. You confess all your sins from the past year. And then on the tenth day, you ask God for forgiveness. That tenth day is called Yom Kippur. And for a religious Jew, this is a very holy time.

Lent is a lot like that.

The only difference is that instead of ten days of self examination, you get 40.

Is that because Gentiles sin 4 times more often than Jews do? Maybe we need all the extra time we can get to get things straightened out (just kidding).

Does anyone know how Lent got started?

It’s not in the Bible. There is no verse that says "Thou shalt celebrate Lent."

Around 230 AD, a group of Christians started fasting for the 40 hours leading up to Easter. They were preparing their hearts for Easter.

Pretty soon, the idea caught on. Years later, they bumped it up to 7 days of fasting. And they called it Holy Week. And by 325 AD, the church officially made it 40 days

Maybe you’re thinking, "Sorry, pastor. But there’s no way that I’m going to fast for 40 days. That’s just out of the question. It’s not going to happen."

And my answer is "That’s OK!" God is more concerned about what’s in your heart than he is about what’s in your refrigerator.

In Mark 7:18-20, Jesus says that it’s not what goes into your mouth that makes you unclean. It’s what comes out of your heart."

It’s those secret sins in your life that you can’t quit. The grudges that you can’t let go.

Maybe it’s an issue you can’t resolve.

Romans 3:23 says "For all have sinned and have come short of the glory of God."

And that’s why Ash Wednesday is such a good thing.

• It’s a chance for us to inventory our lives and come clean.
• To clear the air between us and God.
• To repent of our sins.

Dr. Bernard Nathanson the leading abortion doctor in the United States. He performed 75,000 abortions. He thought he was doing the right thing. Because he believed that a woman had the right to do what she wanted with her own body.

But something changed all that. They invented the ultrasound. That equipment allowed you to see the baby inside the womb. The first time he saw an ultrasound, he was with some other doctors in training. On the monitor, he saw the baby’s heart beating. And when the technician zoomed the camera in, he could see that all four chambers of the heart were pumping blood. And that’s when Dr Nathanson came under the conviction of the Holy Spirit. He said, "O my God, that’s not a fetus. That’s a baby!!!! I’ve been killing babies! God, I’m so sorry."

And then he wrote an article in the New England Journal of Medicine. In the article, he said, "In abortion, we are taking life. That fetus is not mere tissue. It is human life!"

And not only was Dr Nathanson sorry for all of the abortions he performed, but he made a decision never to perform one ever again.

Following that time he became active in the pro life movement. Years later, he accepted Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Savior.

That’s true repentance.

It’s not just about feeling sorry for yourself because you did something wrong.

It’s feeling sorry enough to change your life.

It means saying, "I’m sorry for what I’ve done.

And I’m not going to do it anymore!

No more giving in to the same old sin!

As of this moment, I am making a change in my life for the better.

I’m starting right now!"

There are two Greek words in the New Testament for repentance.

The first one is metanoia, which means to change your mind.

When you repent, you are changing your mind about your sin.

And you are changing your mind about Jesus Christ.

In Acts 2:38 when Peter says "Repent and be baptized, every one of you," he’s using this word.

He’s saying that if you want to be right with God, you have to change your mind about the way you’ve been living.

The second Greek word is anastrepho, which means to turn around.

Changing your mind about your sin is not enough.

You have to turn your life around and stop sinning.

In John 5, when Jesus heals the crippled man by the pool of Bethesda, he says, "You’re ok physically. But you’re not ok spiritually. You’re messed up. You need to stop sinning, or something worse is going to happen to you."

Think of a wife and husband heading for the Hickory Point Mall. The wife tells the husband to turn on highway 51 north from I-72. But the husband goes straight toward Champaign. When he realizes what he has done, he says to his wife, "I’m sorry, honey. I went the wrong way."

But if that’s all he does, he’s still going to end up in Champaign.

His apology isn’t enough to stop them from heading in the wrong direction. What he needs to do is to stop the car. Turn it around. And start heading in the correct direction that his wife wanted him to take in the first place.

That’s the way repentance works.

It’s when you realize that your life is going in the wrong direction. And you turn it around. And start heading toward Jesus Christ.

In a very compact way, Proverbs 28:13 tells us how to do this.

Number one: You have to confess your sin.

Get it off your chest.

In Alcoholics Anonymous, they always tell you that the first step toward getting sober is being able to say, "I have a problem. I’m an alcoholic. And once you can do this, you will find mercy and understanding and support.

The same thing is true with God.

Do you remember the story of the Prodigal Son. Remember how he disrespected his father by taking his share of the inheritance while the father was still alive? And he wasted it all on alcohol and parties?

But after he hit rock bottom, he realized the error of his ways. And he got up and went back to his father.

Remember what he said? "Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired men."

And do you remember how the father reacted? He could have said, "You’re not my son! You’re a loser! You’re a lousy, no good low life! Get off my property!"

But that’s not what he did. Instead, he said to his servants, "Bring the best robe. And put it on my son. Put a ring on his finger. Put sandals on his feet. My son’s alive! I prayed for him to come back to me day after day. And now I have him back safe and sound! Praise God!"

That’s how God treats each and every person who comes back to him in humble repentance.

• No matter who you are.
• No matter what you’ve done.
• You can still come back to the Lord.

One time, the evangelist D. L. Moody visited a prison to preach to the inmates. After he had finished speaking, Moody talked with a number of men in their cells. He asked each prisoner this question: "What brought you here?" Again and again the prisoners told him: "I don’t deserve to be here." "I was framed." "I was falsely accused." "I was given an unfair trial." Not one inmate would admit he was guilty.

Finally, Moody found a man with his face buried in his hands, weeping. And Moody asked him, "What’s wrong?" And the prisoner said, "My sins are more than I can bear."

Relieved to find at least one man who would recognize his guilt and his need of forgiveness, the evangelist exclaimed, "Thank God for that!" Moody then had the joy of leading him to Christ.

Like the man behind bars, each one of us is a prisoner of sin. But if we confess them openly, we too will find mercy.

And once we confess our sins, we also need to forsake them forever.

Proverbs 28:13 says:

"Whoever confesses AND forsakes them finds mercy."

Forsakes them! Leaves them!

There was a guy who accepted Christ as his Savior. The next morning he went to a neighbor’s house and said to him, "Do you recognize this old watch?"

The neighbor said, "Yes. Those are my initials; that’s my watch! I lost it eight years ago. How did you get it, and how long have you had it?"

The man said, "I stole it."

The neighbor said. "But that was 8 years ago. What made you bring it back now?"

The man said, "I was converted last night, and I wanted to give it back to you first thing in the morning. If you had been up, I would have brought it last night."

What a powerful testimony!

This man was so radically changed by the power of God that he was determined to get rid of anything in his life that God didn’t want him to have.

When Jesus met the woman caught in adultery, He didn’t say, “Well, I saved your from sure death, have a nice day.” He said, “Go and sin no more.”

Confess and stop sinning.

That’s what Ash Wednesday is all about.

• It’s about getting rid of our sin.
• It’s about admitting to God that we are nothing but dust and ashes without him in our lives.
• It’s about confessing our sins and forsaking them forever.
• It’s about turning our whole lives over to Jesus Christ.

I invite you to do this tonight.

Remember: God knows everything.

He knows all about the sin you’ve tried to hide from the world.

He knows the thoughts that run through your head.

And he knows that you can never be truly happy unless you hand it over to him.

Remember that God loves you.

Isaiah 30:18 says that he longs to be gracious to you.

And Proverbs 28;13 says that “whoever confesses and forsakes his sin will find mercy.”

Confess and stop sinning!

His arms are open wide. He’s waiting for you to come back to him tonight.

I encourage you to receive Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior.

Let’s pray.