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| "Remember You are Dust" by Fr Lawrence Lew, O.P., on Flickr |
Isaiah 58:3-9a
“Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day,
and oppress all your workers.
Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to strike with a wicked fist.
Such fasting as you do today
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the fast that I choose,
a day to humble oneself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush,
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?
Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the thongs of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them,
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you,
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
[Jesus said to the disciples:] 1“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven.
“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
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If I were to say to you, "You're grounded," how would you hear that phrase?
To a pilot, being grounded would be news that she was prohibited from flying.
To a ship’s captain, being grounded would me that his vessel had scraped land.
To a teenager, being grounded means that they are in trouble and are stuck at home on a Friday night instead of going out with friends.
To an electrician or engineer, being grounded would be an assurance that they weren’t in danger of an electrical shock.
To a parent, telling them their child is well-grounded is a compliment of the highest order, affirming that child’s ability to stay well-balanced, true-to-self, and full of integrity in the midst of either blessing of adversity.
All of these connotations of being "grounded" bear one important similarity. They all have something to do with the literal earth beneath our feet, whether we are being told to stay put, whether the ground has slowed us up or provided us a stable foundation. Being grounded, in any sense of the phrase, has to do with standing in place, on a firm foundation, and being connected to the dirt.
Which, if you think about it, is what Ash Wednesday is all about.
The dust on our forehead reminds us of the ground from which God fashioned that first human being, called Adam, from the Hebrew, adamah, which means earth or ground. Adam and all humans are adamah, earth-creatures. Each of us is a creature of the earth who inhabits the earth, who works the earth, who protects the earth, who creates and fashions life from the earth, who will, one day, be laid to rest back into the gentle earth. We are people of the ground.
By smudging ash on our foreheads, by hearing the words, “remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return,” by taking an honest look at our sin and an honest look at our mortality, Ash Wednesday serves to re-ground us. To reconnect us in a physical way with the earth from which we were made. To reconnect us in a spiritual way to God, who is the source and ground of our being.
The cross we bear on our brow is the eternal reminder of God’s claim on us. Whenever we feel lost or fragile, we can trace the cross over our foreheads, again and again, to ground ourselves in the fundamental truth of God’s love and mercy.
For well over a year now, I have tried to remember to add the act of blessing to Sam’s bedtime routine. After putting on pjs, after brushing teeth, after reading books, after settling him in his crib, after turning on music and turning off the light, as I pull up the blankets, I reach down to make the sign of the cross on his forehead and say to him, “God loves you.”
This routine ebbs and flows, of course. Some nights I’m tired and I forget. Some nights I bless him before I pull up the covers, other nights I bless him when I leave the room. Sometimes I bless him when I have to go into his room in the middle of the night because he’s had a bad dream or because he’s kicked off all of his covers. Sometimes when I say “God loves you,” Sam tells me that I did it wrong, and that I should say, “Jesus loves you,” and makes me do it over so I can do it right.
The beautiful part of this simple blessing is that many times, Sam will bless me back, making a fervent and misshapen cross on my forehead and telling me, “God loves you.” And not just at bedtime! There were a few weeks when Sam asked to bless me every time I left the house after dinner to head to an evening meeting. There was a morning a few weeks ago that Sam crawled into bed and blessed Matt before giving him a good morning hug. Sam has blessed me, Matt, and even his baby sister.
Let me tell you. When a three year old little boy reaches up to make the sign of the cross on your forehead and bless you, your world stops. Wherever else your brain or heart have been wandering, those little fingers and that little smudge on your forehead snap you back to reality. They ground you. They set your feet firmly back upon the most simple truth of all: God loves you. God. Loves. You. Yes, you!
The cross of Christ is the heart God's grace and forgiveness. And so every time we receive the sign of the cross, we are brought near to the ground once again, reconnected with the good news of our salvation: God loves you. God. Loves. You. Yes, you!
The cross marked on us in oil in baptism is our anointing as children of God. The cross marked on us in ashes tonight is our reminder that neither life nor death can separate us from the love of God. The cross of oil that we mark on the heads of those who are dying is our assurance that every breath unto our last is filled with God’s Spirit. The sign of the cross that we make in dirt over a body as it is being laid in the earth is the good news of resurrection rising from the ground.
In the cross, and especially in the cross of ashes, life and death and the promises of God are all met together. Nadia Bolz-Weber, in her book Accidental Saints, explains it this way:
”If our lives were a long piece of fabric with our baptism on one end and our funeral on another, and we don't know the distance between the two, then Ash Wednesday is a time when that fabric is pinched in the middle and the ends are held up so that our baptism in the past and our funeral in the future meet. The water and words from our baptism plus the earth and the words from our funerals have come from the past and future to meet us in the present. And in that meeting we are reminded of the promises of God: That we are God's that there is no sin, no darkness, and yes, no grave that God will not come to find us in and love us back to life." (Nadia Bolz-Weber, Accidental Saints, p. 112-113)
For the next forty days, this season called Lent, we remember the cross on our forehead as a sign not just of our mortality, but of the extraordinary good news that, no matter what our wilderness wanderings, God will yet come to find us and love us back to life through the cross of Christ.
This good news of God’s love spills over into our Lenten disciplines of prayer, fasting, and giving, all which are tangible ways of grounding ourselves in God’s love for the sake of the world. Jesus and Isaiah warn us and encourage us that these disciplines are not for show, but that they are to rise from the heart of our calling to love God and love neighbor, as we have first been loved.
We fast, that we might strip away distractions or idle pleasures that try to tell us that life is about self-indulgence. We pray, that we might reconnect with the heart of God and intercede on behalf of the needs in our world. We give charitably, that we might care for the immediate needs of our brothers and sisters and the immediate groanings of creation. We work for justice, that we might seek lasting and systemic care for all people, land, water, and creatures. We worship together, that we might weekly draw close to the source of life, receive nourishment by water, bread, and wine, and then go forth into the world with the praise of God on our lips.
Siblings in Christ, our calling this Lent is to stay grounded. To cling to the cross as the meeting point of death and life. To reconnect to the heart of our faith. To get back to basics. To renew ourselves to the holy tasks of caring for one another and for the world that God made.
Remember, O Mortals, that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.
Remember, O Creatures of the Earth, that the hands of God who created you shall also be the hands that embrace you in your heavenly home.
Remember, O Body of Christ, that you have been sealed by the Spirit and marked with the cross forever.
Remember, O Beloved Children of God, that God will to bring forth eternal life from the dust and the ashes.
Blessings to each of you in this holy season. May you stay grounded, now and always, in the good news of Christ, the one brings mercy, forgiveness, and newness of life.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
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