Ash Wednesday
Observed on Sunday March 9, 2025
Matthew 6:1–6, 16–21
March 5, 2025
Grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
The text I’ve chosen for this morning’s sermon is the Gospel from St. Matthew.
When God created Adam, He created a masterpiece. Miles of arteries, veins, and nerves. Organs which work in harmony and a brain that controls them without us thinking. Our hands are incredible instruments which enable us to swing a hammer and thread a needle, to move cinder blocks and separate coffee filters. We use them for work, for sports, for crafts, and so many other activities. God’s creativity is amazing. Sometimes though we misuse what God has given, right? The hands which hug and soothe can be used to hurt and kill. The hands which can fold in prayer can extend a middle finger. And what controls these actions? Is it our brains? Nope. It’s our hearts that determine what we do with our hands.
Jesus says, “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” It’s not a question of whether Jesus’ disciples will be using their hands to help the needy or to do good for the sake of others, it’s how they will do it. Donating to the poor was already an expectation among the Jews; even the poor were expected to help those who were poorer than they were. The givers, receivers, and society are blessed by acts of charity. Like all things that are good, sin also ruins charity, and Jesus calls out those who were doing acts of charity not for the poor but for themselves. They blew their own horn when giving their offerings in the Temple. They want everyone to see them and praise them. Instead of praising God for the gifts they’ve received which enable them to help others, they praise themselves as those who are so giving, and so much better than the others who give less than they do. If we’re honest, we’re guilty of the same kind of thinking at times, right? But just like in the time of Jesus, our rewards fade until they’re all gone.
Jesus condemns the pride that takes the acts of charity and makes it about themselves. Others may keep their good works to themselves while still feeling sinful pride inside because they think they’re better than others. The cause is the same: unloving hearts. Jesus says, “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing!” What He means is that the minute we start to dwell on what our hands are doing, is the minute when we take our focus off our neighbor and their needs to make our giving all about ourselves. Our neighbor should be the focus. God should be the focus. Why do we do acts of charity? Out of thanks to God! It says something about our sinful condition when even our acts of charity can be full of pride in ourselves. It may not look like the praise we get from others, but like public praise, our private praise of self is a reward which doesn’t last. Jesus shows us that our sin is much worse than what we do or don’t do with our hands.
The problem is the condition of our heart. Jesus says, “Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person” (Matthew 15:19–20). This condition of the heart makes us look at God’s demands and see how woefully far we fall short. This is what you’re reminded of this evening. As you received the ashes on your forehead, you heard the words “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” We die because we are sinners, plain and simple. If our lives were left in our own hands, as amazing as they may be, the only reward that we will have earned is God’s judgment and wrath.
The recognition of sin is not merely something that we can handle by an outward display of contrition. The Lord is calling sinners to true repentance of the heart. As God said through His prophet Joel: “Yet even now, return to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments’” (Joel 2:12–13). God calls us to repentance, a sincere one, over all our sins, one that is deeply saddened by all our sinful actions and words.
David also knew this heart condition. He wrote about it in Psalm 51: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” David knew that he couldn’t heal himself by the work of his hands. He needed the hand of the Lord. He needed the expert physician who can create a clean heart to blot out David’s iniquities, to restore the joy of the Lord’s salvation. And we need it too! Our hearts and our spirits need to be cleansed and recreated.
In Matthew 9:12, Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.” If you’re like David and know that your heart is not well, then hear the words of Jesus. He has come for you as the only one who can cure the sinful disease of the heart. He has come as the good physician who is able to give you a new heart and make it beat in His expert hands according to the steady rhythm of God’s mercy. And He continues to give and hold your heart captive in His hands.
How has He done it? How is it that He gives and gives? He did so by the work of His hands, purely out of love for you. He selflessly gave His very life for you. His right and left hands were stretched far apart upon the cross for you; His death for your life. He has taken your sins upon Himself all the way to death on the cross. God has taken your sin and put it out of His memory. Your sin is now as far from you as the east is from the west. Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The spiritually poor person approaches God with empty hands. We ask Him for mercy knowing we have nothing we can give Him. He fills them. He fills them with peace, forgiveness, and trust. His death leads to a new heart for you. He has given you a heart that doesn’t need to brag about what your hands are doing, because Jesus has done it all.
With your new heart, you know that your empty hands have been filled with God’s good gifts and are not concerned with rewards of praises from others or ourselves. You have the reward from your Father who sees in secret. Now, as you live your life, as you give to the needy, as you share the Gospel of Jesus with others, keep your right hand and left hand ignorant of each other in daily repentance. In fact, remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Those words placed on you in the shape of a cross serve as reminders that your life has been marked and sealed by the redeeming hand of your crucified and risen Lord. Your giving is the Lord’s work through you and we praise Him for what He has done for us and what He enables us to do for our neighbors.
Amen
Now the peace which surpasses all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen