February 14 marked the beginning of the Lenten season. Lent is a 40-day season of repentance, fasting, praying, and giving, which prepares us to commemorate Christ’s death rightly and to celebrate his resurrection joyously. If you do the math, you’ll find that we’re 46 days away from Easter right now, but Sundays are considered feast days within the season of Lent. Hence, there are 40 days of fasting.
A woman faces the camera. The viewer only sees from her nose to her hair. Her eyes are closed and a cross is marked in ashes on her forehead.
Photo by Annika Gordon on Unsplash
Ashes were used in the Old Testament to represent humility, repentance, and mortality. When an individual was repenting before God for their sin, they would roll in ashes, sit in ashes, or place ashes on their head, a sign that they were humbling themselves before God and publicly expressing their grief, sorrow, repentance, and need for forgiveness. Ashes were also a sign of one’s mortality. Abraham noted that he was nothing but “dust and ashes.”
We acknowledge our sin and mortality as we come forward on Ash Wednesday to receive the ashes. In accepting the ashes, we are humbling ourselves before God and expressing our need for what Christ offers in his death and resurrection. God’s answer to our sin and mortality is Jesus’ death and resurrection. Christ dies to address our sins and to convey God’s grace and forgiveness. He rose from the dead, triumphing over death and promising, “Because I live, you shall live also.”
So, Ash Wednesday marks the first step in preparing our hearts to commemorate Christ’s death rightly and to celebrate his resurrection. It points to why we need what Christ offers. The statements made by the pastors or priests at the imposition of the ashes indicate this dual emphasis of Ash Wednesday and Lent. They say, “Remember from dust you came and to dust you shall return,” or “Repent and believe the good news.” The first statement points to our mortality. The second is our sin and need for grace.
The truth is, though, I seem to forget my frail mortality, and I’d like to think I’m not alone in that. After all, we were created to walk with God and one another in communion for all eternity.
But then sin entered the world. We were separated from God and from one another. We sense it in our more honest moments. The prophet Isaiah reminded us when he said, “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you so that he will not hear.” (Isaiah 59:2 NIV)
Though the ashes on our foreheads, all gray and smudged, they also remind us that while sin separates us, God is compassionate and constantly calls us back to Himself. His call is to return to Him in repentance, and so with the ashes, in some sense, we receive the forgiveness that He is always faithful to give freely. It’s there that we find God With Us.
Isaiah 61:1–3:
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes.”
Our God is a redeeming God. He is a God of reconciliation. He’s a God of healing, wholeness, harmony, justice, forgiveness, and love. He loved us so much that He sacrificed His One and only Son, Jesus, to die a brutal death He didn’t deserve so that we could be reconciled to Him forever.
Have a blessed Lenten season.
Please Pray For: A prayerful and fruitful Lenten season, that we all might be drawn closer to God.
Please Pray For: Joyce Brosch and her family at the passing of Bob. Please pray for peace and hope in this troubling time.
Please Pray For: Jack Williams who has been diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis.
Please Thank God For: for Kathy who received the organs she has been waiting for
Please Pray For: Geri Nay who is struggling with chemo and heart problems
Please Pray For: Kathy Duitsman, who has breast cancer.
Please Thank God For: Julie whose cancer has stabilized.
Please Thank God For: for The Zellmer family as Bob shows real positive signs in his treatment.
Please Pray For: Joy who is receiving chemo treatments.
Please Pray For: for Leela Izzo, that God would strengthen and heal her.
Please Pray For: Joe and his struggles with addiction
Please Pray For: Those who struggle with housing needs.
Please pray For: all those who are out of work.
Please pray For: all of our EMTs, armed forces and others who place themselves in harm’s way for our sake.
Please pray For: Peace in Israel/Gaza and Russia/Ukraine