Repentance for the Religious

Written almost a hundred years ago, this excerpt from the Reverend John W. Rilling points out one of the main reasons we continue to observe Lent, a period of repentance and discipline for many who call Christ Lord:

“The most awful thing in the death of Jesus,” Archbishop Soderblom reminds us, “is that it was brought about by men who were following or believed themselves to be following good and honorable reasons for their actions. Men of various classes, the guardians of religion and of public morals and of the order of society itself united to crucify Jesus. They were men like you and me.”

That is why we keep Lent. That is why the Church lifts up her voice and calls all Christians repentance. ‘Turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting and with weeping and with mourning.” There is an old Passion hymn, a great favorite in Luther’s day, that opens with the question, “O thou wretched Judas, what hast thou now done?”

Fortunately, the hymn is no longer sung, for as Luther pointed out it tends to keep the Passion back in a by-gone day as though it were none of our affair. More to the point is the personal and deeply penitent confession of that other Passion chorale, “Who was the guilty, who brought this upon Thee, alas my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.” He was wounded for our transgressions.