THE TURTLE

ASH WEDNESDAY 2007

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17

The Rev. Dr. Keith Dobyns

When I was eleven I loved to explore in the quiet woods near my family’s home in Maryland. It was a magical place of discovery, filled with hiding places and small wildlife. I spent hours beside a tranquil stream running through those woods. Next to that stream I found one day a box turtle. He had a cunning, wise face that he exposed to me after several minutes. Thinking that I had found a true friend, I picked him up and carried him home, and made a small pen for him in the yard next to our garage.

My mother was not impressed with this idea. She believed my turtle belonged in the woods, but she finally agreed to see how it worked out. Unfortunately, after a few days my turtle escaped his pen, and no where could he be found.

He was eventually discovered, a few weeks later. He had crawled into the garage to die, and the smell of his decomposing body led to his discovery.

I felt terrible, of course. My mother suggested that I could honor him by taking him back into the woods, back to the stream. I put my now quite smelly turtle in a paper bag, and walked through our neighborhood and into the woods, then down the path toward the stream. My conscience ached; the smell was a constant reproach and reminder of my responsibility for this creature’s death.

Part way down the path, on sudden impulse, I swung my arm back and hurled the turtle, paper bag and all, in a high arc toward the stream. Immediately I was horrified, watching that paper coffin arc through the summer air toward a tragic crash on the rocks. I felt the most intense shame that I had ever experienced in my short life. I had stolen a life; I had mistreated a wild creature; and in my final violent act I had betrayed my friend and refused to honor his life. Forty-seven years later I can still vividly remember the hot flush of shame, the twisting knot in my stomach, and the burning tears of that moment, as I waited to hear the crack of his shell on the rocks of the stream bed.

I have had other causes to feel shame since then – countless causes, countless times. I imagine that all of you have also. Life is filled with occasions of shame. Do you remember the first time you encountered how deeply flawed you were? That even your best efforts resulted in the wrong outcome? We quickly become shame averse, and we try to engineer our lives to avoid these moments of self reproach, but life is messy and filled with surprises. We all are broken, we live our lives in need of healing.

We try to cover it, of course. We live carefully; we keep secrets; we deny, and deny, and deny. We deny our flaws to others; we deny our flaws to ourselves, and we deny our flaws to God. We will do anything to avoid the Day of Judgment.

And then we encounter the scriptures that summon us to observe Lent.

Listen to Joel.

Blow the trumpet in Zion;

sound the alarm on my holy mountain!

Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble,

for the day of the LORD is coming, it is near-

a day of clouds and thick darkness!

Like blackness spread upon the mountains

a great and powerful army comes;

their like has never been from of old,

nor will be again after them in ages to come.

Joel will not abide complacency. Our actions have consequences. Our denial is futile. There is judgment. We are accountable. The day of the LORD is coming.

Within my own liberal Christian tradition, the Day of the LORD can be something of an embarrassment. I’m ok. You’re ok. God is love. Grace triumphs over all.

I believe these things, yet still I experience shame and guilt. I fear God’s judgment when I neglect others, or when I am greedy, or when I am mean, or boastful or self-absorbed. Don’t you also sit down on the occasional evening and feel that you will have to account for your actions that day? Surely you do.

Our church year is incomplete without the observance of Lent. Lent acknowledges that we are accountable. We stand before God in need of judgment. We can not understand the love and mercy and forgiveness and grace that God offers to us so freely, without first comprehending why we need it so desperately. We are sinners. We all miss the mark. We don’t get Easter without Lent.

Yet Joel offers us up a rich reward for our penitence.

Yet even now, says the LORD, return to me with all your heart,

With fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;

Rend your hearts and not your clothing.

Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful,

Slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love,

and relents from punishing.

Our faith offers us the opportunity to be accountable, to stand in judgment before the LORD. We are given the time and space, in the season of Lent, to measure ourselves and find ourselves wanting, and to lay those flaws before God. The sins, the shortcomings, the shameful secrets, the moments we carry that we think no one else would ever understand – Lent gives us the opportunity to place these as offerings before the LORD. Our sins become an offering; our guilt becomes a fellowship; our shame becomes the beginning of our wisdom.

Listen again to Joel:

Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast;

Call a solemn assembly; gather the people.

Sanctify the congregation; assemble the aged;

Gather the children, even infants at the breast.

Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her canopy.

Between the vestibule and the altar

let the priests, the ministers of the LORD, weep.

Let them say, “Spare your people, O LORD,

and do not make your heritage a mockery,

a byword among the nations.

For years, as an adolescent and young adult, I carried the shame of my treatment of that turtle. Each time I remembered it I could hear again the crack of its shell upon the rocks, and I felt despair. Each time I relived it I would flush with shame.

What does the memory of that turtle have to do with Lent? Just this. When finally I shared it with another person it began to fall gently into place as part of the fabric of my life. That memory never became trivial, but by the grace of God it was transformed. Now it seems an inevitable moment of lost innocence. It was the beginning of my appreciation of the intricate web of life, and of the need to honor death. It has become an occasion of wisdom instead of shame. Now, when I see a turtle, I appreciate the great humor of its creator. The turtle is my friend.

And so I call you to the observance of a Holy Lent. Take the penitential scripture readings seriously. Reflect upon the broken places in your lives, and offer them to God. Confess – to God, to your family and friends, to your spiritual mentor, counselor or priest. Experience God’s judgment by acknowledging those broken places, living in the certainty that God will heal all wounds. Together we will walk the way of the cross, and as we walk that walk we will discard our burdens on the side of the road.