Medicine of Immortality "It's a cold, and it's a broken, 'Hallelujah!'"

Buried with ChristPosted by Rick on February 25th, 2004

Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return. The words hit me hard as I sat at the kneeler and my pastor ashened my forehead with a cross. Here’s something I wrote last Wednesday. The quotes are from Schmemann’s Great Lent (The italicized stuff is Scripture for those of you that think I’m just pushing baptismal theology.):

Thus Lent: Ruminations on a Paschal Journey.

Last September, my roommate was excommunicated from the Church of Christ. He called me over today to tell me he was moving to Texas and ask me if I wanted any of his old books. As I drove home from his house, I lamented that he would not be attending Ash Wednesday services with me this year. Attending last years Ash Wednesday services with him was one of the most vivid memories I have from our relationship. The day holds even more significance for me now, for the name Ash Wednesday originated from the medieval custom of sprinkling with ashes the heads of penitents under church discipline who wished to be restored to the Church.

My friend said his main reason for leaving the Church was that he was on a journey to find out what he really believed about life, love, and God. As soon as I came home, I picked up a book on my desk. Ironically, the first words read, When a man leaves on a journey, he must know where he is going. Thus with Lent. Lent is a journey, a microcosm for the journey of life. Its destination is Easter, the Feast of the Resurrection. As I see my old friend spiral down into meaninglessness, I am reminded that one cannot understand the journey of life without understanding the journey of Lent and its connection with Easter. Traditionally, Lent was a time of preparation before catechumens were baptized at the Easter Vigil. And while this connection no longer exists in many circles, the Church needs to recognize the historic connection between Easter and baptism as well as Lent and baptismal preparation because the biorhythmic cycles of life bring us back to the same place, over and over. The Christian life should be one of constant dj vu.

While everyone knows Easter is about the Resurrection of Christ, we fail to recognize that Easter is also about our resurrection. For as many as were baptized into Christ put on Christ and were baptized into His death . Therefore, we were buried together with Him through the baptism into death, so that even as Christ was raised up from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we should walk about in newness of life . And yet we dont. We get busy. We forget the new life given to us in baptism. We forget Gods claim on our lives. And through this forgetfulness, failure, and sin, our life becomes old againpetty, dark and ultimately meaninglessa meaningless journey toward a meaningless end. We manage even to forget death and then, all of a sudden, in the midst of our enjoying life it comes to us: horrible, inescapable, senseless. And each time we fail, we eventually realize that we have alienated and exiled ourselves from God, from life. Drifting from God, we lose our joy, our soul, and our life.

Thus Lent. For most people, Lent is about what one has to give up. At first, we only see the monotony of Lent. However, if we begin to appreciate Lent by slowing down the whirlwind of life and realizing its powerlessness over us, monotony is transfigured into peace. Sadness is transfigured into a realization that we must recover what we have lost, what is all around us and yet so distantGods presence. Lent is a special time, set apart by the Church, to accept the reality that we do just about everything we can to ignore, escape, and evade God. But God calls us to die so that we may live. Lent is a special time in the rhythm of life in which we die with Christ to be raised with Him on the Resurrection Day. Martin Luther called this the Theology of the Cross. The Theology of the Cross is meeting God where He chooses to find usin the darkness of our sin, in our rejection of His Word, in pain or weakness. As we die with Christ each day, and especially in this Lenten season, let us look forward to His raising us daily, at Easter, and at the Last Day. As we continually partake of His death and resurrection, let the pattern of His life become the pattern of ours.