Remember, O Man, That Thou Art Dust
A Reflection on Ash Wednesday
This year will mark my first time participating in the liturgical feasts of the Church. Having journeyed through Advent at the close of last year, I was particularly eager for my first Lent and Easter. But one thing that had slipped my mind, (in my ignorance) was the celebration of Ash Wednesday, marking the beginning of Lent (particularly in the Western Church).
This morning, I attended a short, and rather small service at our little country parish, I assisted our priest in the liturgy, and was promptly smeared with ash in the form of a cross, while the priest looked solemnly into my eyes and spoke the words “Remember, O Man, that you are dust…and to dust you shall return… Turn away from sin, and be faithful to Christ…”
It was a sombre moment to say the least. The ashes themselves, I knew, symbolised repentance, mourning, and the bearing of sin [Esther 4:1]. They also spoke of mortality, as the Prayer Book so aptly puts it ‘ash to ash, dust to dust.”
But it is significant, going out into the world with such an obvious sign on your forehead - marked, exposed if you will. I may as well go about shouting “Unclean! Unclean!” [Lev 13:45]. Indeed… I felt as though I should rather sit with Job “amongst the ashes, scraping himself with a potsherd…” [Job 2:28].
I heard, viscerally, the pronouncement of God to Adam [Gen 3:19] in a way I had never before. As the priest marked me, I felt the grief and the dread of Adam, and the weight of the words of St Paul, “for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” [Rom 3:23] - “through sin, death entered the world… and death reigned from Adam to Moses…” [Rom 5:12, 14]. These words, to be sure, had always had a place in my mind, but I had never felt that reality quite like I did this morning. And now I bare the visible sign of that realisation on my forehead for all to see.
Yet there is also a hope in this. At Ash Wednesday, we begin a period of fasting and contrition known as ‘Lent’ as we journey with Christ toward Calvary, and ultimately, the empty tomb.
I had often thought that ‘Lent’ maybe had something to do with old words for ‘fasting’, but it turns out that it probably has more to do with the ‘lengthening of days’ due to spring (at least in the Northern Hemisphere…we here in the south have everything back to front… truly the ‘edges of the world’). But even this led me to further reflection - the lengthening of the days… (I’m sure they’ll definitely feel longer as I fast and my stomach begins to feel the ‘lengthening’ between meals). But perhaps our back-to-front symbolism here in the southern hemisphere is helpful? The days for us actually get shorter…(heading into winter), and this recalls for me the shortness of my life, as the Psalmist says (in a very Lenten fashion):
“Behold, thou hast made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing in thy sight. Surely every man stands as a mere breath! [Selah]
Surely man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nought are they in turmoil; man heaps up, and knows not who will gather!”
[Ps 39:5-6]
The reality of our mortality and the shorter and cooler days perhaps encourage us, as St Paul writes in his epistle to the Hebrews, “not to neglect meeting together, as some have the custom, but exhort one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near" [Heb 10:25]. ‘The day’ being that of Good Friday, and of Easter Sunday, at least from a Lenten perspective, but of course St Paul had in mind that great day, the parousia of the Lord, when we will see Him face to face, and all proclaim ‘Blessed is he who comes in the Name of the Lord, Hosanna in the Highest!” [Ps 118:26; Matt 21:9]
In any case - a slight deviation on the symbolism of the word and season of ‘Lent’ aside - it is this reality of sin and death, frailty and nakedness, that serves as the starting point for our salvation. It is this visceral realisation, given by the Holy Spirit, of our deep need for the Father’s grace, and the transforming and redeeming work of Christ in us, that urges us to “set our faces as flint” towards God, in pursuit of Christ as he journeys toward the completion of his work [Lk 9:51; Isa 50:7].
We have the great hope and glory of Easter set before us in Transfiguration Sunday, marking the transition between Epiphany and Lent. During the evening liturgy on the Saturday before Ash Wednesday, our priest urged us, as he read from Lk 9:28-36, that we must strive and eagerly seek for the revelation of the glory of God in our life, even when we least expect it. As Christ and his friends made the difficult journey up the Holy Mountain, and sat exhausted at the peak while Christ prayed, the Lord’s appearance… “was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white”, as his glory was revealed before their very eyes.
Likewise, I pray that as we journey through Lent, as we journey up the mountain so to speak, that God may visit us, and as we sit, exhausted, at the peak come Good Friday, that the Lord may refresh us and strengthen us, come Easter morning, by the revelation of his glory in the risen Christ.
This is the blessed hope that those ashes on our foreheads are not the end of the story. For as St Clement points out in his Epistle to the Corinthians,
“…the Creator of the universe shall bring about the resurrection of those who have served him in holiness, in the assurance born of good faith…he shows us by a bird [the Phoenix] the magnificence of his promise…”
[1 Clement 26:1]
This Lent, as he promises in Isaiah, may the Lord,
“ comfort all who mourn, and grant to those who mourn in Zion—
…a crown of beauty instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit;
that they may be called oaks of righteousness,
the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified.”
[Isa 61:2–3]
That our “mourning may be turned into dancing” and that we may be “clothed in gladness” praising him forever more [Ps 30:11–12].
May the words of the Collect for Ash Wednesday, guide our prayers and expectations:
Almighty and everlasting God, who hatest nothing that thou hast made, and dost forgive the sins of all them that are penitent: Create and make in us new and contrite hearts, that we worthily lamenting our sins, and acknowledging our wretchedness, may obtain of thee, the God of all mercy, perfect remission and forgiveness;
Through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.