Dear Friends,
March 9 is the first day of Lent. It is a sorrowful season in the church year, where we examine our sin honestly and look forward to the death and resurrection of Jesus that we will shortly celebrate at Easter.
Lent is a solemn time for the church. During Lent, many people fast or give up something to remind themselves of their sin and the sacrifice Jesus paid because of that sin. Likewise, during Lent, the church will “fast” by not using the word “Alleluia” or singing the Gloria in Excelsis. We will withhold our celebration of these things until Easter morning, when Christ rises from the tomb and announces to the world that He has destroyed the power of sin, death, and the devil.
The first day of Lent is known as Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday has historically been a day of penitential self-examination. We look at our sin and our shortcomings and realize that, because of our sin, we deserve nothing but death. On Ash Wednesday, we go back to the Garden of Eden, where God told Adam that because of his sin he would eat bread by the sweat of his face “until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” Friends, God is speaking these words to you and me in our sin as well as to Adam.
From these words onward throughout the pages of Scripture, ashes have been a sign of mourning sin and death. When King David’s daughter Tamar was raped by her brother, she put ashes on her head as a sign of mourning the sin that had invaded her family (2 Samuel 13). When Mordecai learns that the King Xerxes was tricked into ordering the death of all the Jews, he put ashes and sackcloth on (Esther 4). When Job lost his family and possessions, and he himself stricken with disease, he sat in ashes to mourn the effects of sin upon his family (Job 2). There are even more examples of this in Scripture. Because of sin, we are no more than dust and ashes.
This year for Ash Wednesday, we have the opportunity to continue that biblical tradition with the historical “Rite of the Imposition of Ashes” (putting ashes on ourselves). This has been historically done to signify that “I am a sinner, and because of it, I deserve death.” On your way into the service, if you would like to receive ashes as a symbol and reminder of the death that results from your sin, I will be standing in the back of the church with ashes burnt from palm branches (used to celebrate Christ’s entrance into Jerusalem the year before). Using olive oil mixed with the ashes, you may have the sign of a cross placed on your forehead or on the back of your hand. While placing the cross on you, I will say “Dust you are, to dust you will return.”
This is something that is completely and totally optional on your part. But it can be a great way to remind ourselves that we are sinners, and to help and focus our Lenten devotion upon Jesus Christ and Him crucified for our sins and the sins of the world. Last year there was nothing more humbling than to see a cross made of ashes upon Ella. She was only 2 months old, and yet, we know from scripture that she already was a sinner and in need of Jesus to redeem her from sin, death, and the power of the devil.
I know that to some, this may sound like a “Roman Catholic” practice, and yes, the Roman Church does practice the “imposition of ashes” on Ash Wednesday. However, the act carries a huge amount of symbolism that has been practiced in churches across the denominational spectrum. Lutherans, Catholics and all other Christians are sinners and in need of repentance and forgiveness.
Finally, as you go home following the service and wash off the ashes, you may be reminded of your own baptism where, in water and the word, death was washed off of you, and you were given the promise of eternal life and forgiveness of sins. In Jesus, you have life and life to the full.
On Easter morning, we are able to rise ash free with a clear conscience and declare “I am forgiven, just as Christ is risen indeed!” What a blessing. Please consider participating in Ash Wednesday services March 9th.
God's Blessings,
Pastor Adam Moline
