ASH WEDNESDAY

ASH WEDNESDAY

I live on the Alabama gulf coast where Mardi Gras is a big thing. After all, we started it and New Orleans copied us. Parades, throws, costumes, moon pies, beads, etc. are signs of Mardi Gras celebrations. Suddenly they stop on Ash Wednesday when many of us go to our churches for a service that includes having a cross marked on our foreheads with ashes. It’s a visible sign that reminds us of two things:
(1) Our humanity: “remember you are dust and to dust you will return.”
(2 )The gift of God’s forgiveness and new life: “repent and believe the gospel.”

During the forty days of Lent, we are given the opportunity to intentionally discipline ourselves to let these two things find deeper root within our lives. For example, to claim our humanity with its time limited opportunity on this earth may propel us to savor the sunrise/sunset; to take great delight in our loved ones; to reach out beyond our divisions to others; to live in the here and now more than the then and there; and to really live our life with gratitude and courage.

Likewise, to be more consciously aware of God’s forgiveness and strength for beginning again can motivate us to cultivate our relationship with God; to find ways to help others to know that they too are loved and given new life; to serve the least, the last, and the forgotten ones as if they were Jesus in disguise; and to live more congruently with our words (beliefs) and our actions.

After the Ash Wednesday service many youth and adults who leave the ashes visible find people in stores mentioning to them “Did you know you have a smudge on your forehead?” It becomes an opportunity to say “Yes, and this is what it means to me.”

We live in a world that needs a visible reminder of our humanity and God’s forgiveness. The forty days of Lent lets us “be” the ashes others will see. So my question to you is this...
“How will you make a ASH of yourself?”