Readings for the Day
What do you love about Lent?
Many of us would say, “Nothing!” Who needs an entire seven weeks of being reminded how we don’t measure up? I can work up plenty of guilt and shame all on my own, thank you very much.
Most of us lump guilt and shame into one basket of unworthiness and emotional yuck. But did you know that they are distinctly different? Guilt is about something we did or didn’t do, breaking some social norm or rule. Shame is about judging our own self-worth based on unmet expectations.
While guilt can be useful - more about that in a moment - shame can be debilitating. As our Lenten practices and fasts draw our attention to the things that separate us from full and healthy relationships with God and ourselves and one another, encountering our guilt and shame becomes inevitable. And that feels vulnerable, like layers of our self being peeled back and exposed.
While very few of us like to feel vulnerable, one thing to love about Lent is that it is a season of permission to try different ways of living with less shame and guilt. Lent provides a spiritual reset button that refocuses us on God’s desire for love in all things.
Let’s go back to shame and guilt for a moment.
Shame is the feeling of not enough that motivates us to try harder. In the end, we will always fail to satisfy the internalized critic. Shame is a form of hate. Shame researcher Brene Brown says “You can’t hate yourself into being better, and you can’t hate other people into it.” Changing our thinking and habits of shame happens with listening, empathy, understanding, and intention.
By contrast, guilt is rooted in LOVE. In deep love for another - be that another person, creature, creation, God. Guilt is feeling remorse for an action that hurts another. Guilt, or the desire to not feel guilt, can motivate us to change our behaviors.
Our Lent practices draw our attention to guilt in its constructive form. Not to dwell in guilt and let it overwhelm us, but to acknowledge that we have it and ask ourselves how we reset our spiritual habits to honor the love we feel instead of offending it. Making this shift is living the future we desire.
Discipleship, or following God, means prioritizing the ways we honor and love others and God over our own desires. Self-sacrificing love leads to stronger, healthier, and more faithful relationships.
We know how to build strong relationships because of the example God gives us. The collect today refers to God’s mercy. That nothing we do or say can separate us from the love of God, from being worthy, seen, and respected.
God does not shame us. God loves us unconditionally, and expects us to do our best to love God and God as reflected in other humans and all creation. God always forgives us when we ask. God’s love is not a bargaining chip for our affection. With tenderness, mercy, and grace, God loves us as we are. And loves us into becoming more than we think we can.
Romans reminds us that following the rules (the 10 commandments, and the law they developed into in Hebraic tradition) is no guarantee of faith, just of very human guilt and shame, which do not equal flourishing. God’s promise is grace, not punishment. God does the seemingly impossible: giving life to the dead and calling into existence things that do not exist. God breathes life into parts of us we think are dead, unworthy, unloveable and refutes our shame.
God calls into existence things that do not exist. “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” In creation, all things come to be from dust. From tiny particles of matter came all life. God has the power to re-enliven what we think is dead - in our hearts, in our community, and in our world. In a congregation rooted in an urban neighborhood, rebuilding resources of people and finances after a pandemic, God calls into existence things that feel non-existent - creativity, hope, joy, community, in new ways. With faithful expectation and humility, we look and listen for God breathing life into us.
“Humility comes from the Latin word humilitas, meaning groundedness. Humility allows us to admit we are wrong—we realize that getting it right is more important than needing to ‘prove’ that we are right. Humility is key to grounded confidence and healthy relationships.” Thanks again to Brene Brown. (Atlas of the Heart)
Our Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, self-examination, reading scripture, and giving our time and energy to others as a form of alms-giving are all about humility. They ground us in getting the relationship right and invite us deeper into confidence in God’s grace and love.
Confidence that we are beloved, strong, and worthy - just as we are.
“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” And all may flourish.
Because none of us need more guilt for things we did or didn’t do. None of us need to perpetuate or increase whatever shame we already carry.
We can let go of the anger and hate that germinate in shame. We can surround it with empathy, affirm the hurt, and tenderly remind it that getting it right is more important than proving we are right. Because, in the end, all we really want is to feel loved. And hate doesn’t drive out hate, only love can do that.
Instead use some healthy guilt, grounded in love - of God, and humans with whom we have relationships, and ourselves - to cultivate humility, through prayer, self-reflection, almsgiving - and let more love grow and flourish.
Join me after worship to share our Lenten intentions with one another, to find one, to check in, to support one another in our own individual journey toward discovering deeper love and humility.
What I love most about Lent is the opportunity to reflect with you on how God, through Jesus’ example, calls us to love in ways that are hard and vulnerable, gives life to the dead and calls forth in us and the world new and seemingly impossible things. Sisters and brothers and siblings in God’s love, so be it. Amen.
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