The world is ending, or at least, that's what it seems like to the prophet Joel, whose name means, "the Lord is my God." Our reading today is from the second chapter of the book of Joel, and if you look at the first chapter of this book, there's evidence to suggest that the actual calamity was a plague of locusts. Such a plague doesn't sound too serious in our day and time, disconnected as we are from the patterns of the earth, but to a community directly dependent on the produce of the land, this is a disaster to end all disasters. It ensures death, not by the sword, but by the slow, cruel, inexorable mechanism of famine, for, in a day, in a week, all the food is gone. But to Joel, this plague becomes more than merely a natural disaster. It is the day of the Lord, a day of clouds and deep darkness, an apocalyptic end of the world. When the day of the Lord comes in this way, there is nothing to do, but to go back to the beginning, to remember our dependence as creatures of this earth, and to remember that a new beginning is a gift in and of itself.
About seven years ago, I was an assistant at a different parish. I was still a transitional deacon, and would not be ordained priest for another two and a half months. And, as it comes every year, Ash Wednesday came around. I did not think much about it. I had been to Ash Wednesday services for years, even, while I was singing in choirs, going to several services in one day. I went through the early morning service we did just fine. Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. But at the noon service something happened. A young mother came up to the altar rail with her baby, who was no more than four months old. And I hesitated for just a second. Because I was expected, more than that, required, to put ash on this four-month-old baby girl's forehead and remind her that she was dust and to dust she, newly born, would return one day. This child, still in the bloom of her new life with us was given a reminder, whether she understood or not, that she too would one day die. That she too, was a child of earth, dependent on the grace of God for her breath, and that one day that breath would leave her still-brand-new body.
As it happens, there was a photographer at that service, and so I have a picture in my office of this event. Even years later I can look at that photograph and see myself, and the young woman, and the top of the baby's head as my hand makes that mark on her forehead, and the memory of the event brings me to a halt. Because it's so contrary to our expectations! Whatever science may tell us, secretly, somewhere within us, we tend to think that we will live forever! That if we just do the right things then the certainty of death will pass us by. If we just exercise more, or smoke less, or buy the right products, or have the right surgery, that somehow we can get an exemption on our mortality!
But that's not how the cosmos works, not even for little babies, who sometimes die before they get the chance to grow up into children and then adults. And Ash Wednesday brings us straight up against that reality once again, that for us, our personal world will one day end, and we will die, whether we like it or not, no matter how much we fight against it. We lose, on this day, the illusion that we are forever masters of our own fate.
Whatever may or may not happen to the world at large, (and the Christian tradition is pretty much unanimous that the world will one day end, we just disagree on when that will be or whether speculating on the exact time frame and mechanism by which it will occur is a worthwhile practice) whatever may or may not happen to the world at large, our personal worlds will end in the relatively near future. In the next, say, just to be safe and account for all possible medical developments, and realizing that there are some very young people here with us today, let's say in the next 150 years, everyone in this room will have died. The world is coming to an end. Our world is coming to an end.
Just as Joel's world was coming to an end. And so as we try to respond to the truth of our own mortality, our own dependence on God even for the very air we breathe we might well look at what Joel does and does not do. First off, Joel is not even remotely interested in answering the question so many of us find so fascinating, "whose fault is it?" He passes over that one without a glance. He's not even much concerned with "how did this happen?" which is a nicer form of the same question. Instead, he offers a model for responding to the end of the world. "Sanctify a fast. Call a solemn assembly; gather the people. ... let the priests, the ministers of the Lord weep." (Joel 2:15, 17). We depend on you, O Lord. We cannot survive without your grace. The actions Joel commands his people to take have to do with recognizing that they cannot survive on our own. Just as in the Exodus, when the People of God were in the wilderness, there is nothing to eat, and they depend solely on God for the bread, the manna, that sustains them. When Joel commands the people to weeping and mourning, fasting and ashes, he is reminding the people of Israel that their truest life comes not from food, but from God. He is reminding them, in the face of this disaster, that they are dependent beings, but that, this state of dependence is not disastrous! For to be dependent on God, Joel proclaims, is to be dependent on the most generous, most gracious, most fully loving being there is. And in that dependence, we find a new beginning.
People talk about going back to square one, or going back to the beginning. In board games this is usually a bad thing. But in our lives as Christians, going back to the beginning is often the only thing that can be done with any integrity. When we realize that our lives have gotten out of control, or that we are too concerned with our net worth, over and against our self worth, when we see that our children are suffering because we spend too much time at work, or when we realize that our focus on getting ahead at all costs is indeed costing us too much, then there may be nothing to do but to go back to the beginning. But it is not the end. It is the beginning that we go back to.
That new beginning, in dust and ashes, is a gift. Every Lent we are given this chance, this slightly gentler new beginning than the one the people of Israel faced in the prophet Joel's time. We are offered the chance to realize our own mortality, and to accept that dependence as the starting point for a new life. Now is the chance to start over, to refocus our lives not on our personal glory, or wealth, or power, all of which fall to dust eventually anyway, but to focus instead on the life of the spirit, and the life the Holy Spirit is calling us to live. The practice of a Lenten discipline, of ‘giving up' something for Lent, or, as some do, taking on some regular practice, is intended to help us enter into this time, to remind us that even those things that we think are most important, are not the source and center of our life.
Last night we had our pancake supper, and at the end of it, we were cleaning up the glitter, and the decorations. I was working last night with a young girl who is part of youth group, one of the few who stayed that long. She said that she had not yet decided what to ‘give up' for Lent. Now, I was impressed that she knew enough to spontaneously bring up the possibility of giving up something for Lent! But she said she hadn't decided what to give up yet. As I said, there weren't that many people left by this point in the evening, so someone, from across the room, heard her and suggested that she give up her cell phone, or give up texting, that is, sending text messages to her friends. She ruled this out immediately, without a second's hesitation. "Anything that has to do with the cell phone is off-limits" she told me. In other words, it was too precious, too important, too crucial, to give up. And that's perfectly understandable. But if she did choose to give up her cell phone, or something equally central to her life, she might realize on a whole new level what she already knows in her head, that, in the end, that she is not dependent on her things, not even her cell phone, but on God.
Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return, we will all be told in a few moments. But also remember that it was from dust that God brought us forth in the first place. God formed the human one from the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the human became a living being! (Genesis 2:7) The dust is not an end. Today we are, in that very dust, given a new beginning, a chance to start over once more.
As we wear these ashes today they remind us that we are mortal, that no matter what we do, we are dependent on the Spirit. Wearing them throughout the day is not an attempt to glorify ourselves, but a recognition of that dependence, and an attempt to begin a new way of life. As this season of Lent unfolds, I hope you will accept that new beginning, and let the power of God transform your life.
Amen.
Key passages: Joel 2:1-2,12-17; 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10; Matthew 6:1-6,16-21; Psalm 103