For he knows our frame;

    he remembers that we are dust.

~ Psalm 103:14

One of the most powerful moments of my ministry life was the first time I imposed ashes on the foreheads of God’s people.  There was an older saint who ambled down to the front.  She was in her late 80’s I think.  She had this intense and earnest look in her eyes, and I spoke the words: “Dear Sister, remember you are dust, and to dust, you will return.”  The reality of death met me in the words that I spoke, and in the ashes I imposed in a real person who knew death was more near now than 30 years earlier.  It overwhelmed me.  It humbled me.  

Ash Wednesday forms and shapes us to be a people to remember our frame.  We practice it, because we want to remember that we are not God, and that we have limits.  We are not in control of our own lives.  We are dust, and to dust we will return.  In a world that worships the young, that sterilizes death and thinks at some level that our progress will save us from the inevitable.  The ashes, the words and the practice places us back into the hands of God.  And the Psalmist takes great comfort, because of God’s intimate knowledge of our frame.  He lives and sits into that frame.  God knows we are dust.  What a tender thought.  He knows we are fragile, frail, weak, needy, limited by breath, time and space.  He knows we are dust.  This life is a vapor, and Ash Wednesday reminds us that this life is a gift.  We have no guarantees our life will extend into tomorrow.  But we do have a guarantee that God knows this about us, and because He knows this, He will uphold us and through His resurrected life renew and re-enliven us, breathing into us the breath of life.  That breath will resurrect our dry bones and bring this dust new life. 

Almighty God, you have created us out of the dust of the earth: Grant that these ashes may be to us a sign of our mortality and penitence, that we may remember that it is only by your gracious gift that we are given everlasting life. (Book of Common Prayer) 

Marked By Ashes

Ruler of the Night, Guarantor of the day . . .
This day - a gift from you.
This day - like none other you have ever given, or we have ever received.
This Wednesday dazzles us with gift and newness and possibility.
This Wednesday burdens us with the tasks of the day, for we are already halfway home