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Ashes to Ashes - March 1, 2006

Ashes to Ashes

Ash Wednesday

March 1, 2006

Rev. Dave R. Garwick

Christ Lutheran Church, Maple Plain, MN

Every year on this particular evening I get reminded of what I like to think of now as a simple “liturgical malfunction” that happened many years ago but still lives on in the memories if not the scars of this congregation … which I will not revisit in this sermon. In an effort to deflect attention away from myself, I have searched far and wide for real life stories of OTHER people’s Ash Wednesday stories.

So I came across something that happened recently in a Methodist church in Kilbourne, Ohio. Since we have no Methodist churches in town to offend and since these people are too far away to verify the truth, I thought I might tell their story. It seems that as they were coming down the aisle for the imposition of ashes on their foreheads, little two-year-old Brenna Wagoner became upset that her mother was not taking her to the altar. She cried out, "But I want to get a tattoo just like Daddy's!"

Now of course this kind of thing would never happen here because we DO invite you to bring your kids forward … if you still think it’s safe. But the story is a good one, because it does raise the question that a LOT of people wonder about: “why the ashes?”

Well, if you go back to the very first time that the word “ashes” occurs in the Bible, you come to the story of how Abraham was negotiating with God in an effort to keep God from destroying the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. First, Abraham says, “But if there are as many as fifty righteous people there, will you wipe them out too?” God relents and agrees that if there are as many as fifty righteous people there He will not wipe out the cities. So, Abraham takes it the next step and you can almost hear him quaking in his boots when he says the next thing that becomes Ash Wednesday:

Abraham spoke up again: "Now that I have been so bold as to speak to the Lord, though I am nothing but dust and ashes , what if the number of the righteous is five less than fifty? Will You destroy the whole city because of five people?" (Gen 18:27-28)

“Though I am nothing but dust and ashes …” That is where this ashes thing comes from. That is why the last thing that is ever said to you by a pastor will be this: “We commit his body to the ground; earth to earth; ashes to ashes, dust to dust ….” And that is why, on this night, you are marked with ashes with the phrase, “ashes to ashes and dust to dust.” It is a reminder that our journey here is just a temporary one. It reminds us that we are mortal: “ashes to ashes and dust to dust.”

But you are not just marked with ashes. You are marked with the sign of the CROSS. When we speak about ashes and dust at the graveside, we first say something else: “In sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ, we commend to Almighty God our brother …” We only talk about ashes and dust “in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Otherwise there would be nothing but despair and we would be denying the essential Good News of what Jesus Christ has actually done for us!

There is a second reason for the ashes. Jesus once denounced the cities in which most of His miracles had been performed, because they did not repent. He scolded them by saying, "Woe to you, Korazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! If the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes . (Matt 11:20-21). Jesus was very big on repentance, on turning around in confession and a change in behavior. In the Old Testament days, people began their repentance by wearing a rough, punishing fabric called sackcloth and by throwing dust and ashes on their heads. So we do ashes tonight as a sign of repentance. Hopefully we will show more than a SIGN of repentance.

So two reasons for the ashes: as a sign of our mortality and as a sign of our repentance. But again, as Christians we only speak of our mortality in light of what Jesus won for us in the promise of our resurrection. Likewise, we speak of repentance in light of what Jesus won for us in the promise of forgiveness.

Because we live in the promise of the resurrection and in the promise of forgiveness, we are going to do the ashes a little differently than many churches will do tonight. As soon as we receive the ashes we will then receive His body and blood for the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting, both secured BY His body and blood.

As we spend the next six weeks asking ourselves “Why A Suffering World Makes Sense,” remember that everything which Jesus won for us, He won through suffering. THAT is the most important reason why a suffering world makes sense. We’ll talk more about that in the weeks to come.