A sermon delivered by the Rev. Dr. Patrick H. Wrisley on Ash Wednesday, March 5, 2025

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

^6.1“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. ²“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. ³But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, ⁴so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

⁵“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.⁶But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

¹⁶“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. ¹⁷But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, ¹⁸so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

¹⁹“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; ²⁰but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. ²¹For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.^[1]

                  I am very fortunate in that my father and mother-in-law left me a little something I was able to put towards retirement. It’s not a lot and its value lies more in the fact they thought enough of Kelly and me to give it as opposed to the modest value it carries. But it’s all I have, and I want to be shrewd with what resources I do have. So, tomorrow I have an appointment with my Fidelity guy to see what I need to do with what little I have that seems to be getting slammed since tariffs were imposed. For me, this is a season for the reevaluation of investments.

For us, this Ash Wednesday service is analogous to a conference call into our Spiritual Fidelity Office. Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the forty-day season of Lent when we are asked as followers of Christ to reevaluate how we are investing our spiritual capital.  Jesus’ words from the Sermon on the Mount provide us with a loose metric we can use as we make our way through this Lenten season together to best determine how we are investing in the treasury of heaven.  Our text lists four points of reference for us as we look at our spiritual investment in our relationship with God.

Metric One: We are to take stock of our personal piety.  Piety refers to a person’s natural, non-forced outward expression of his or hers deep sense of religious devotion, reverence, or fidelity toward God. Jesus is warning against a forced, unnatural expressions of a person’s fidelity toward God as he talks about blowing trumpets to get people’s attention as you are making your offering or piling on verbose prayers so others can see how “religious” we are.  A person’s natural, unforced expression of their piety emerges from the simple but devoted way we live our lives as disciples of Jesus. The widow who quietly places her mite in the Temple’s offering coffers demonstrates her life as a loyal follower of God. The sinner who is on his knees asking God for forgiveness in contrast to the robed and verbally flatulent Pharisee waxing on and on is another example of a natural display of piety. The question for you and me is how our simple faith and devotion to Jesus is displayed to those we encounter. Is it even noticeable?

Metric Two: Giving – Does what we spend our money on reflect our core spiritual values? Does our giving reflect we are investing in the work of Ministry through Christ’s Body, the Church? Does that $20.00 bill feel heavier going into the offering plate at church than it does splurging for a night out at Park and Elm? Lent is the time we get a feel for how heavy or how light our money feels as we give it away. Like the Ring of Power in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings that gets heavier and heavier when the wearer tries to get rid of it, so often our giving gets the same way. Like the Ring, we want to hold onto our Precious. Lent is a good time to evaluate our lives of stewardship and our relationship with “stuff.”

Metric Three: Prayer. Lent is a time to take a long look at our prayer lives. I describe prayer as the intentional cessation of busyness for the purpose of listening and being present with God.  You’ll note I did not say it was our conversing with God; conversing with God is not a problem with most people who get in a bind and shoot a flare up for God’s help. The biggest issue for most of our prayer lives is that we fail to take time to simply sit and be present with and to God. I would suggest honing our prayer skills by simply remaining silent as we listen for the Spirit of Life trying to speak with us.

Metric Four: Fasting. Jesus is telling us today that those who fast and make a miserable spectacle of it are totally missing the point. Our fasting does not draw attention to ourselves; it directs our attention to and hunger for God. For our purposes, I would like us to understand fasting as those particular spiritual disciplines we each practice to firm up the foundation and core support for our faith. Instead of ceasing to eat or deprive ourselves of certain things, maybe we take up the discipline of daily reading of scripture. Perhaps it’s intentionally rising before you normally do and consciously spend ten minutes sitting in God’s presence. Maybe the way shore up our spiritual foundation is to make the effort to intentionally serve those who are poor, hungry, or destitute one day a week throughout these forty days. Our fasting is our spiritual work of orienting ourselves to God through the service to God and others. 

Piety. Giving. Prayer. Fasting and spiritual disciplines. I lift up these four metrics for us to consider as we evaluate how we are investing in our spiritual life and capital. The Holy Spirit walk with us as we seek to invest our lives wisely. Amen. 

© 2025 Patrick H. Wrisley, Pastor, First Presbyterian Church of Glens Falls, NY 12801. Sermon manuscripts are available for the edification of members and friends of First Presbyterian Church of Glens Falls, New York and may not be altered, re-purposed, published or preached without permission. All rights reserved.

^[1] New Revised Standard Version (NRSV). New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.