Ash Wed 2024

 

Little bits of dust float through beams of light coming through my window.  In that moment, they sparkle like jewels.  I remember as a kid in my fantasy world wondering if they were fairies or part of some other delight I had yet to discover.  Remember that you are dust.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, the lights in the sky, the land and the water, every plant--green, purple, red, and blue, every creeping thing, flying thing, and swimming thing, and then God created humankind from the dust of the earth, from clay.

The first day of Master Gardener Class is about the size of the particles of soil.  There are big particles, they are like grains of sand.  It is hard for them to share their nutrients because they haven't broken down.  Silt is the middle sized particle.  Clay is the teeny tiny particles of soil that leave very little air between them for roots to easily grow through.  God chose the clay to breethe into to create human beings--breating life into this compact, stubborn, but resilient kind of soil to make us. 

Today we are reminded where we came from--earth, soil, dust, clay and the breath or Spirit of God, and where we're going, back to dust and ashes again.  We are reminded today that we will die.

Somebody, an adult, asked me the other day why we have to die.  I answered that if we didn't, we'd have no reason to make children, such an enjoyable activity and also the children can also be enjoyable.  There's a Valentine's day funny for you!   

Death adds a sense of urgency to this life.  There are things that must be done.  In one of my social justice meetings last week someone said, "Now that I have lived more years than I have left, I am tired of waiting.  I want to act. I want to see changes in this world!"  This woman is impatient for the damaging structures of our society to change. 

The fire that was kindled in her was from knowing what is most important and being motivated to work for it.  She's ready to see justice roll down like waters and ready to participate in acts that bring it about, to make herself clay in God the potter's hands, to be useful for bringing in the Kingdom.  May we experience this sense of urgency, too.

Knowing we are going to die can help us live in the moment, to appreciate this beautiful life, our families, a moment of sunbeams and dust, a little crocus coming up, that we have feelings to tell us when we have a sliver or heartache or a fire in our gut motivating us to move. 

We have this moment as a gift, not knowing how many more of these moments we will have, so they are limited and precious. 

Today, this is special.  We have friends joining together. I have to stop and experience the moment, how grateful I am to have colleagues so faithful and caring, how blessed we are to be doing this work in different settings, all in the family of God together.  May we experience the gratefulness of the moment.

Death means that some things will come to an end that need to--pain, cruelty, hunger and crying and grief.  Guilt will come to an end.  Regret will come to an end.  I'm counting on the end of these things. 

Ash Wednesday reminds us what is temporary--certainly the high regard and praise of others is one of those fleeting things that comes and goes and is not what life is all about.  People noticing our piety and liking us is not one of those things that lasts or matters. 

Ash Wednesday reminds of what endures.  As we celebrate Valentine's Day, and considering what matters and lasts, love comes to mind at the tippy top.  People choose this 1 Corinthians reading of our opening litany for weddings, almost without exception, except it's not about love between lovers, but about agape love, self-sacrificing love, especially that Jesus has for us, and God has for the cosmos. 

 This agape love is what brought about the creation of everything, keeps everything in relationship with everything else in the cosmos, and helps us to humble ourselves in proper relationship to others.  Agape love is not destroyed by death, but love continues to continue, abides even, until all are made one by love.  "Faith hope and love abide, these three, and the greatest of these is love."

On Ash Wednesday, we put ashes upon our brow, not to parade our piety around, but to signify that we are vulnerable and in need, that we know we are in a position of needing God's love and care and signifying a willingness to let ourselves be loved. 

Receive these ashes, what you come from and what you are going to.  Receive these ashes of forgiveness and new life.  Receive these ashes in vulnerability and opennness to God's love.  Receive these ashes, and be transformed by love and grace into the body of Christ, the beloved.