Ash Wednesday 2019

Who Knows?

“Blow the trumpet in Zion! Sound the alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming, it is near--a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness spread upon the mountains a great and powerful army comes; their like has never been from of old, nor will be again after them in ages to come… Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him,

a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord, your God?” [Joel 2: 1-2, 12-17]

“In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the field was yet in the earth and no herb of the field had yet sprung up – for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was no man to till the ground; but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground – then the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living thing.” [Genesis 2:4b-7]

It is a toss-up. It’s a toss-up as to which of these, the verse from Joel, or the verse from Genesis, is perhaps the most precious and touching verse in all of Holy Writ. Consider Joel. The prophet sees a vision of total destruction of the land for the people’s unfaithfulness to the Lord’s commandments to Love God and Love neighbor [ Leviticus 19: 18, 33-34]

For lack of Love, God will vanquish the land. Famine and dust bowl and depression and refugees and agribusiness and climate change and HIV/Aids and terrorism and warfare and opioid addiction and gun violence and domestic violence and violence against LGBTQ people and violence against women and racism are images that may come to mind. But, says Joel, who knows? Who knows? That is the question for us all.

Yet, there is time to repent, to return to the Lord, to make a sacrifice and an offering for our sins. Yet, who knows? Who knows that God himself will not, out of love and compassion and being slow to anger and merciful and abounding in steadfast love, perhaps this very God will sneak into the Temple which is now empty due to the fact that there is no animal and no plant to sacrifice at the altar of the Lord, and leave an offering of cereal and drink?

Who knows, maybe God will repent, return, on our behalf and even provide the offering we are unable to make ourselves, so that this merciful God can then forgive us. Do we get the power of this at all? Can we begin to comprehend a God who loves us this much? A God whom we pray this day hates nothing, as in no-thing, that God has made. Can we grasp this? No wonder this God gets upset and angry when we presume to hate anything that God has made. Or, anyone. This is what grieves God the most, we can be assured: our hatred of others, our mistreatment of others, our lack of compassion, charity and love.

Yet, Joel imagines, the prophet imagines, the prophet calls for us to imagine that such a God is so abounding in steadfast love that God himself will sneak into the empty Temple of our lives and leave our offering of repentance for us so that God can get on with the business of forgiving us. Who knows?

But then, reading the verse from Genesis chapter two, how could it possibly be otherwise? Before anything at all was, the Lord our God scooped up a handful of dust, breathed into it, and poof – there we were, male and female made in God’s own image. Imago Dei! Made in the image of God, male and female and all creation. When we sing, “He’s got the whole world in his hands” do we even remember how it all began. How we began? In God’s hands: one moment there is nothing but dust, the next moment male and female in Gods’ own image, Imago Dei!

This is why we are here today. To remember how it all begins. To remember how we all began. All as in all. As in the God who hates nothing and no one God has made. To remember: We come from Love, we return to Love, and Love is all around. We are but dust and to dust we shall return. But we are Holy Dust, Sacred Dust – and as science has told us we and all of creation are made of Stardust! Who knew? Who knows?

All. Nothing. Then everything. God breathes into a handful of dust and we became living beings. God gives us our very breath. “By the inspiration of the Holy Spirit – the Holy Breath – the Ruach, the Breath of God.”

We mark ourselves with the Holy dust of last year’s palms, the holy ash of last year’s hosannas which so quickly turned to dust, betrayal and loss; the ashes of all the times we forgot about God’s love; the ashes of all the times we forgot to love all things, all persons, respecting the dignity of every human being; the ashes of our own incapacity to help ourselves. As these ashes are placed upon our foreheads, can we imagine a God so in love with us that God will make the “we are sorry” offering of our repentance on our behalf so that this same God who breathes life into our nostrils with the inspiration of God’s own Spirit-breath, can get on with the business of forgiving us?

Who knows, says the prophet? Who knows?

We know. We are those people who know. That is why we are here. Even if we cannot worthily lament our sins, we are here because we can imagine God will stoop to help us lament and help us make offerings and help us to rend our hearts and open our hearts so that God can move in and make us well again – make us whole again.

As far as the east is from the west, so far does God remove our sins from us. “Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and magnify thy Holy Name.”

Who knows?

We take time this day to know so that we can say, “Yes, Lord, we know! We know you hate nothing you have made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent. We know you are the God of all mercy, and love, and compassion. Who knows? We know!”

Amen.