A Meditation for Wednesday after the First Sunday in Lent | Ember Day
By Eric Chin
Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid, cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit that we may perfectly love thee and worthily magnify thy holy name, through Christ our Lord. Amen
Each week, my favorite prayer at the Mass is the Collect for Purity. I love it for its brutal honesty and for the mysterious way that it turns me to God. It’s a prayer that’s at the same time centering and orienting, humbling and opening. As we pray this together, it helps me to open my hands before God, and it reminds me in my heart, mind, body, and soul that He is almighty and merciful.
Somehow, in just a few words, this prayer calls to mind all of those deep desires and secrets that I would want nobody to know about. And this prayer confronts me in those dark corners of my heart with the Truth: our Almighty God does know my deep desires. He does see. No secret of mine can be hidden from him.
Our gospel text reminds me of this prayer, and the leper in the story can illuminate the prayer afresh. This leper would have been a man afflicted by leprosy–and perhaps not simply afflicted but “full of leprosy,” as St. Luke recounts. This man was suffering from something that would have been utterly incurable, something that would have been like a living death. It would have been an unrelenting decay of his body. In my imagination, he may have even lost some fingers or limbs. He carried upon his very body visible signs of death.
What’s more, this would not simply have been a physical ailment, but it would have made this man ritually unclean. He would be cast out in society, forced to live on the periphery for fear of making another unclean. He would have had torn clothes and unkempt hair, and he would have been required to proclaim “Unclean, unclean” wherever he went.
I wonder how long this man has suffered from leprosy. I wonder how he usually spent his time. I wonder what he may have experienced. Does he have any physical pain from his condition? Does he have any hope of healing? Does he have any friends? Does he feel the ache of loneliness? Does he feel shame or insecurity for his perpetual uncleanness?
I have trouble imagining any good answers to those questions–certainly because of the disease itself, but also because this man’s leprosy points to a different kind of disease. This disease is still one that is utterly incurable. It’s still a disease that’s unrelenting. It’s a disease that decays the body. It’s still a disease that reaches towards death.
We are this leper, afflicted by leprosy of sin. And just as this man is full of leprosy, so are we full of our sin.
St. Mark’s description of the leper’s approach to Jesus is striking. He comes “begging” and “kneeling,” and approaches Jesus with nothing less than a holy courage and a deep humility. His words are few, and he speaks only to Jesus’ power to heal and his capacity for mercy: “If you choose, you can make me clean.”
And Jesus’ response is equally striking and perplexing. It is both compassion (ESV) and anger (NIV) that move Jesus to reach out to this man, saying, “I do choose; be made clean!”
How could Jesus’ response to this man come out of both compassion and anger? These are two notions that seem somewhat disjointed.
Considering first compassion, Henri Nouwen writes that “compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.”
This is certainly the shape and texture of compassion that Jesus embodies: one that is so fully incarnate into human pain and brokenness, and one that is so present to misery and loneliness and sorrow.
But what of anger? That he would offer healing to the man tells us that he was not angry with the man himself. Rather, I imagine Jesus being angry in his compassion. Having already healed so many of their diseases and having cast out so many demons, I imagine that Jesus is angry against the powers and principalities that hold and afflict all of creation. I imagine that Jesus is angry against the sicknesses and diseases that reach so far and touch so many. And I imagine that Jesus is particularly angry at the disease of death afflicting one created in God’s image.
In both compassion and anger, Jesus reaches out to this man and speaks with clarity and in determination for his sake: “I do choose; be made clean!”
“Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid . . . ”
May this Gospel and this prayer invite you to consider the leprosy of your sin. What are those dark corners of your heart? What misshapen desires might you cling to and feed? What secrets might you be trying to hide?
And may the Gospel and prayer invite you to bring your leprosy with holy courage and humility before Jesus, who has the power to heal you and the capacity for mercy. “If you choose, you can make me clean.”
“Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit . . . ”
May you know that Jesus reaches out to you in his compassion and anger, offering to you his cleansing mercy. Jesus will contend with your leprosy. He will go to you where it hurts, into places of pain, into your brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. To your misery and loneliness and tears. He reaches out to you, and when he meets you there, he speaks to you: “I do choose; be made clean!”
“that we may perfectly love thee and worthily magnify thy holy name, through Christ our Lord. Amen.”
And may you behold Christ, our Lord.
Eric Chin lives in Austin, Texas, where he works as a director of engineering at a cybersecurity software company and loves serving the local church. Eric is pursuing theological education through a hybrid-distance program at Nashotah House and is pursuing ordination in the Anglican Diocese of Churches for the Sake of Others (C4SO). The readings for the preceding devotional may be located here from Forward Movement.