Ash Wednesday 2020

If you haven’t guessed it yet, or if you’re new to Redeemer, today is a different kind of service. There’s a different feel to today. There’s a different look. There’s a different tone and atmosphere. We’re doing things differently today. There’s more silence, more reflection and prayer. Today is different, because this day is set apart from all the other days.

This is a different kind of day/service

What is tonight all about?

But what do we mean by it’s set apart? Well that gets at the question of how do we mark or order the days of the year? Is it by weather patterns and seasons? Is it by holidays? Some of us after New Years immediately start looking forward to MLK weekend, and then to Memorial Day, and the to the Fourth of July. How do you mark the days of the year?

We follow liturgical calendar - orienting our life around Jesus

Well for thousands of years, Christians across the world have sought to mark their days according to the life of Jesus. And so very early on in the Christian faith, they created what’s called the church calendar, so that followers of Jesus could wrap their lives and the rhythm of their days around the life and rhythms of Jesus.

Now, I did not grow up knowing about this or following this calendar, but I’ve come to realize the immense gift that it is to the disciple of Jesus. Because here’s the thing: we all have favorite moments of Jesus’ life. We all have favorite lines of Jesus that tug at our heart strings or stir up this intense feeling of purpose. We all have aspects of Jesus’ character and teaching that we love most. And left to our own devices, those are the teachings, those are the moments of his story, and those are the aspects of his character that we’ll focus in on. And all of that other stuff, other teachings, other moments of his story, we keep at arms length, out of sight, out of mind.

Forces us into times that we wouldn’t normally seek out and engage.

There are more sides to the story of Jesus and our life of faith than just celebration. There’s also repentance, lament, mourning.

But the church calendar forces us into those teachings that we’ve rather avoid, those moments of his life that we’d rather not see. The calendar forces us to look at the totality of his life, and it forces us into a wilderness that we would not voluntarily explore.

Tonight we remember that there are more sides to the story of Jesus and our life of faith than just celebration. There are more responses to the gospel story than just celebration. There’s also repentance and mourning.

Lent is all about Easter - preparing for Easter.

Tonight is set apart, because tonight we stop ignoring the uncomfortable truth that we are deeply flawed, utterly broken, and impossibly selfish. If we had our way, we’d continue the charade that everything is fine. We’d continue to downplay, justify, rationalize the many ways we fail to love our God and love our neighbor. If left to our own devices, we’d continue to think that we could pull ourselves out of the pit that we find ourselves in and show the Lord that we truly are good and worthy to be loved.

Easter should not sneak up on us.

But tonight is different, because tonight we end the hiding and the pretending and the ignoring, and own up to our sins. We own up to our rebellion against God.

Remembering our sin, our need for a Savior.

Tonight we bear the mark that we deserve - the mark of ash - the mark of death. The Scriptures are clear that the inevitable result of our waywardness is death, and so we own that tonight as we take on the mark of ash upon our foreheads. These ashes are the burnt remains of the palm branches we waved in joyous celebration last Palm Sunday. And isn’t that fitting?How inconsistently do we love and serve our God - one day rejoicing in his name, the next day we’re rebelling against it. And because we live a life of rejoicing and rebelling, the mark of the ash reminds us that we also must live a life of repenting.

When you see your neighbors come up here in just a moment, you’ll hear these words spoken over them, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” These are the last words of the curse that became ours because of our sin, and it is good for us to hear it. It is good for us to hear that we are sinners, because the vast majority of the year we try to forget it. But tonight we remember it, and we are marked by it.

But take note of what happens next. You watch as your neighbor stands before the pastor, and you hear those words, that reminder that they are sinners, despoilers of God’s beautiful world, and then they turn around to return to their seat, and what do you see? The mark of ash that symbolizes death displayed on their head for all to see is in the shape of the cross.

You see, tonight is not about condemnation.

It is not simply dry ash that is spread upon our heads, the ashes are mixed with healing oil - oil that has been prayed over for the purposes of healing sickness and disease. In fact, the oil that we’ve used tonight comes from the olives of Gethsemane, the same grove of trees, the same plot of land where Jesus prayed on the night before his crucifixion. And so even as we remember our sin with sorrow, we feel the coolness of the oil as we are marked with the cross of Christ, and we remember that the everlasting life of Jesus is upon us.

When we see the depths of our sin, we see that the love of Christ is deeper. When we see the abundance of our brokenness, we see that the grace of Christ is greater. The mercies of God are stronger than death itself, and we bear that mark tonight.

The journey to Easter begins tonight, with a sober reminder of our sin and desperate state and the hope of newness of life that is ours in Jesus.

And so, let us now call to mind our sin and the infinite mercy of God… (silence)

Almighty God, you have created us from the dust of the earth: grant that these ashes may be for us a symbol of our mortality and a sign of our penitence, that we may remember that it is by your grace alone that we receive the gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

As you are ready, I invite you up to receive the sign of ashes.

Almighty God, you have created us from the dust of the earth: grant that these ashes may be for us a symbol of our mortality and a sign of our penitence, that we may remember that it is by your grace alone that we receive the gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

But I want you to note

We intentionally stop ignoring our sins. We stop downplaying of sin.

We intentionally stop ignoring our death.

The ashes are the symbol of death.

Ashes are the symbol of mourning and repentance.

Ashes mixed with healing oil - oil from the trees of Gesthemane

Four calls for Lent

1. Prayer - connection to God

2. Fasting -

3. Alms-giving

4. Reading and Meditating on Scripture