A couple of days ago during our Ash Wednesday service, I had the immense privilege of imposing ashes upon the foreheads of many members of the St. John’s parish family. It is such an intimate act as people allow the minister to spread the ashes of last year’s Palm Sunday palms across the brows of their faces. As the sign of the cross is imposed, the words “remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return” are spoken.  

I couldn’t help but notice that, like my own brow, most of the foreheads upon which I imposed ashes were wrinkled. Our furrowed brows speak to the years of laughter and pain and joy and sadness and excitement and heartache and glee and worry and so much more that we have experienced.  Furrowed brows are a beautiful and much earned sign that we have lived life and have been touched by the same.

The ashes spread and the words said are signs of God’s presence and love. God creates us out of nothing, journeys with us throughout the triumphs and tribulations of our lives, and draws us back to God’s own breast when our earthly pilgrimage has ended. God with us at our beginning. God with us in the midst of our lives. God with us at the end.  And God always breathing life into the dust of our lives, leading and guiding and loving. The sign of the cross imposed on our furrowed brows with ashes helps us to remember the unfailing, tenacious love of God that just refuses to let us go.

There is a line from a David Whyte poem that strikes me as particularly appropriate for us Christians as we begin our Lenten journey.  Whyte writes, “Sometimes, with the black sticks left when the fire has gone out, someone has written something new in the ashes of your life.” That someone is Christ. And that something new is love. 

~Father Art