The eCrozier

Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them;
for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven.
Matthew 6:1

The poet Langston Hughes, in his poem “Litany,” urges his readers to “Gather up/In the arms of your love/Those who expect/no love from above.” Hughes lists in his litany the kinds of people who hope for nothing, summing up with the words: “All the scum of our weary city.” His poem suggests some personal questions. What do we really expect from God? What do we expect out of life in general? Does God owe us anything? What is life’s reward for us?

Beginning with our own expectations offers us a window to see the mission and vision of Jesus. He addressed those who were looking for and expecting a savior. These people had waited 500 years for a savior and in that time developed religious practices such as: prayer, fasting, and giving alms. These were the ways that they made manifest God’s presence in their lives. It was done rigorously, so that others, especially their children, might learn by their example and understand how God was present in their lives.

But when Jesus speaks, he says: Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them. He might just as well have said: Be on guard against performing and posing. You must realize that expressing God’s presence in your life and in the world about you is a holy discipline. So, when you perform piety and pose with trumpets sounding, you should know that you have already received your reward. Fasting and praying and giving alms are best done in secret, where such faith receives heavenly applause.

What do we expect? Remember Jesus came to redeem sinners, to bind up the broken-hearted, and to set the captives free. When Jesus came, he made God’s love specific and concrete and real flesh. He came to gather up into his arms of mercy all those who were sick, desperate, and tired. In Langston Hughes’s words: “All the scum of the city.” He came to gather up in his arms of mercy all those who expect “no love from above.” What do we expect? Are we some of the lost of “the city” that Jesus has come to collect? Or do we see ourselves as better than that? What do we expect of God and our lives as we begin our Lenten discipline?

We have also felt ourselves to be a chosen people just like the people Jesus addressed in the Gospel. Yet, in Lent we’re called back, warned, and reminded that our faith doesn’t depend on our outward performance of piety. We’re called back and warned that our identity as “chosen” depends on our faith in God’s grace and mercy and not on our outward performance. We’re called back, warned, and reminded in Lent that Jesus is the one who gathers up those who expect “no love from above.”

During our forty-day journey we will in fact discover that we have been chosen. But not chosen so we can feel smug and self-satisfied. Chosen rather for a particular purpose: So we can be sent out to bring into God’s Kingdom all those who right now have come to expect “no love from above.” What else could we expect from a God who dies for the sins of the whole world?

+Scott