FULL TO THE BRIM …

 Photo: Rev. Lisle Gwynn Garrity 

“In life, in death, in life beyond death, you belong to God.”  These traditional words spoken at Ash Wednesday connect our human existence to our Easter faith and the promise that nothing can separate us from the love of God.  No wonder our journey toward Easter and the apex of our liturgical celebrations all year long begin with such words, for truly we belong to God no matter what.  In our fragile and precious humanity, we are each and all broken and beautiful and beloved, so very beloved!

What would it be like if we lived our lives in full faith of this promise that we are absolutely, without-a-doubt beloved of God?  That question is at the heart of what it means to be Easter people and thus defines our Lenten journey, and this year we are making this journey with our friends from A Sanctified Art LLC in a series called Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent.  The authors write:

The scriptures for this Lenten season (in the Revised Common Lectionary, Year C) are filled with parables and promises of God’s abundant and expansive grace.  Jesus as a mother hen, a prodigal son welcomed home, a fig tree nurtured with care and hope, precious oil poured out lovingly and freely, stones shouting out with praise — these sacred texts are brimming with a gospel of grace.  We’ve done nothing to deserve or earn this grace, and yet, like water, it spills over.  Full to the Brim is an invitation—into a radically different Lent, into a full life.  It’s an invitation to be authentically who you are, to counter scarcity and injustice at every turn, to pour out even more grace wherever it is needed.  It disrupts the scarcity mentality that capitalism, oppression, or hierarchy can plant inside of us.  When we allow ourselves to be filled to the brim with God’s lavish love, that love spills over.  It reaches beyond ourselves; like water, it rushes and flows, touching everything in its path.

We recognize that traditional iterations of Lent often emphasize restraint, confession, and piety.  The origins of Lent were that one was to leave their old life behind to fast and prepare to be baptized into a new way of living.  In essence, this was a practice of stepping away from the rat race, corrupt power, scarcity mentality, and empty rituals in order to live a more expansive and full life of faith.  And so, Full to the Brim trusts the promise of our baptisms — God has already claimed us as God’s own and nothing we can do will ever change or erase that.

….If love is our beginning, how can we live our lives led by love’s promises?  [This series] reminds us to live fully — as we pursue justice and hope, or express grief and gratitude.

Like so many things in life, we get out of Lent only what we put into it.  As we rebuild our lives of faith and build up new habits for drawing closer to God and to one another as a church, let us invest ourselves in this Lenten season as we journey toward Easter once again.  Let us plant deep within us these Lenten seeds so that they may grow and break through what we see on the surface, that we may be rooted in the Ground of All Being and blossom with beauty and grace to share with the world.  If we do this, not only will our church's life of faith be full to the brim, but like the Psalmist says, we will soon find “our cup runneth over!”

We belong to God, and so let us take an expansive journey this Lent into the very heart of the One from whom nothing can separate us, for we are truly and forever beloved.

Soli Deo Gloria,

Rev. Michael

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2022 Lenten Sermon Series — Full to the Brim: An Expansive Lent

March 6 – The First Sunday in Lent
“Full to the Brim – Even in the desert”
Luke 4:1-13; Deut. 26:1-11

March 13 – The Second Sunday in Lent
“Full to the Brim – Under God's wing”
Luke 13:31-35; Ps. 27

March 20 – The Third Sunday in Lent
“Full to the Brim – You are worthy”
Luke 13:1-9; Isa. 55:1-9

March 27 – Lætáre Sunday (The Fourth Sunday in Lent)
“Full to the Brim – Prodigal grace”
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32; 2 Cor. 5:16-21

April 3 – The Fifth Sunday in Lent
“Full to the Brim – Brazen acts of beauty”
John 12:1-8; Isa. 43:16-21

April 10 – Palm Sunday (The Sixth Sunday in Lent)
“Full to the Brim – Even the stones cry out”
Luke 19:28-40

April 17 – Easter Sunday
“Full to the Brim – An expansive life”
Luke 24:1-12