Ash Wednesday

We arrive at the Lenten Fast. Today we sit in the dust and ashes. We know we are from the dust, we will return to the dust. When God formed the dust into man and breathed into him the breath of life, it was the life of God being given to man, we were formed into his image, after his likeness. We were without sin, holy and righteous in his sight. Trusting fully in him for every good thing, and perfectly loving those whom God gave as neighbor. There was a perfect communion between man and God.

And then. Sin corrupted. Death became the pattern of existence. The years of our life are 70, or by reason of strength 80. But their span is toil and trouble. They are soon gone, we fly away. We are as the grass, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire. Surely the people are grass.

And so on this day, we cry out to the Lord, “Do not consider us according to our offenses. But be merciful unto us O Lord!” We have sinned against you, but look upon our condition and our trouble, and forgive our sins.

The prophet Joel encourages us today, “perhaps he will relent. Perhaps he will leave a blessing behind him.”

Today, we are marked with the sign of death, reminded of our mortality. And we look around and see that the world is slowly succumbing to death, slowly decaying. The Psalm speaks vividly of the life of the sinner. Hear again his words, as you consider how sin afflicts the body.

2For your arrows have sunk into me,

and your hand has come down on me.

3There is no soundness in my flesh

because of your indignation;

there is no health in my bones

because of my sin.

4For my iniquities have gone over my head;

like a heavy burden, they are too heavy for me.

5My wounds stink and fester

because of my foolishness,

6I am utterly bowed down and prostrate;

all the day I go about mourning.

7For my sides are filled with burning,

and there is no soundness in my flesh.

8I am feeble and crushed;

I groan because of the tumult of my heart.

The image is of one who is wounded, diseased, gangrenous, dying. The stench of death sticks to the psalmist. Those who have ever felt the true weight of their sin, know how realistic this description can be. Those who have ever had life fall apart around them, know how much sin and death can weigh on us physically. How much the pressure of our sin – the pressure of life – can physically hurt us. Can diminish us, wither us away until it seems there is nothing left. If you haven’t felt it yet, you are blessed. Today we hear the Word of the Lord and recognize how great our sin is, how much it damages us and everyone around us. Sin is not content with destroying only a little. Like an infection, it spreads, like leaven, it does not stop until everything is run through with sin and death.

Today we hear the Word of the Lord, we know we are destined for death, because of our sin. It is no more than we deserve. And so today we accept the sign of dust. We accept the sign of ashes.

And yet, each of the readings today reminds us of the love and mercy of the Lord. How much the Lord desires to forgive us our sins, how gracious he would be to us if we would repent and turn away from our sin. That is why the mark of death on us is also the mark of the cross. The cross into which we are baptized. The mark that is put on us is the same shape as the baptismal mark. The cross is also a mark of death. According to our Baptism we have already died to sin. The cross is the sign of the one who has been condemned, who has been killed in agony and pain. Who was shamefully displayed for us.

The salvation of the Lord comes at a price. We desire to hear the salvation of the Lord. We desire to receive the gift. Today – and for the next 6 weeks – we consider the cost. Tonight we especially consider what we are saved from. We are saved from death. As we say each Sunday “I justly deserve your temporal and eternal punishment.” If the Lord sent us nothing by plague after plague, if we endured suffering after suffering, if every blessing was stolen from us in this world, and we were left stircken, smitten by God and afflicted in this world, if all we received from the hand of the Lord was bitterness, a curse: We would be receiving no more than we had earned.

Do we now need to review the Commandment of the Lord? Do we need to hear again what he created us to be, to do? To fear love and trust in him above all else, to love our neighbor as ourselves. And how often has our love of God failed us? How often have we not trusted in him to provide? How often have we doubted the goodness of the Lord? And how much more often have we been indifferent, unkind, unloving to our neighbor, how many ways each day do we sin, and deserve punishment, both now and forever.

And yet, the Lord would not leave us in this condition. He would not have us cast into the lake of fire, but would redeem and restore us. He would cleanse us, if only we would hear, if only we open our hearts to his word of salvation.

We move toward the day when we will hear of the salvation of the Lord in its fullness, we will hear what it cost him to save us. We will hear of the sacrifice of His own dear Son for us. We will hear of the death of Jesus. We will see him once more splayed out for us on the cross, the straining, the agony, the wounds that bit deep, that poured out the life blood of God into the dust of the ground.

We move toward it, but we are not there yet.

For as God has explained to us in Hebrews, “He entered once for all into the Holy Place...” And if we would hear again, if we would go with him into the holy places, we must first cleanse our own hearts. But we find our efforts are ineffective. We can not cleanse, We can not purify. And so the only course left for us is to say “I am of the dirt. Until the Lord cleanses, among the dirt I will dwell.”

Today we begin our time in the wilderness, fasting for 40 days. 40 days of increasing devotion to our Lord Jesus, 40 days of increasing our love to our neighbor. The disciplines spoken of in our Gospel help us in our journey. They remind us that our neighbor is there to love, and so we should make an extra effort to love him with our alms. That the Lord gave us tongues to pray, praise and give thanks, and so we should increase our time of prayer. That the Lord gave us food to support the body, not the body to consume food, and so we separate ourselves from the world of consumption during this season. We make a distinction between ourselves and the world, between these days and all other days. We set them apart so that we might ever more clearly fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the majesty of God.

Because during these days we will learn ever more that we can not cleanse ourselves, but that Jesus would. That we can not purify our hearts by our own efforts, as if our sin is just a stubborn stain that takes a little more elbow grease.

Tonight we hear that sin is already corrupted us, already condemned us to death, to the grave. And yet, God would not have the sinner die. He sends us a great salvation, in Jesus Christ. And so this night, above all others, as we sit in dust and ashes, we hold fast to the cross – we hold fast to our Baptism where we are joined to the death of Jesus on the cross. We say with the Psalmist, “I am yours, save me.” And we know that our efforts this year during Holy Lententide, as important as they are, serve only to point us to the one who does all the saving. We don’t cleanse ourselves, we don’t save ourselves, we don’t even manage to brush off the dust and ashes. Jesus does that too.

We pray and hear, and give, and abstain during this time so that when the time comes to hear of Jesus death, we know that our efforts do nothing. But we desire nothing more than to hear of his love. Of his sacrifice. Of his gift.

Lord, keep our eyes during this season of Holy Lent on Jesus. Jesus always. Jesus only. And we pray “Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner,” knowing that the Lord is merciful, and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast Love.

Thanks be to God.

In Jesus name. Amen.