From the Manse - March

At the time of writing we are two weeks into Lent. One very powerful Lenten symbol is Ash. In some Christian traditions, on Ash Wednesday, ashes are placed on the foreheads of worshippers as a sign of repentance. The ashes used are gathered after the Palm Crosses from the previous year's Palm Sunday are burned.

This piece by David Wade was one of my Lenten devotional readings and the message really struck a chord with me because, like Dave Wade, I am uncomfortable with the triumphalist brand of Christianity. Yes we are an Easter people. And when we walk through the wilderness with Jesus during Lent and when we witness the events of Holy Week and Good Friday, we have the knowledge of resurrection and the hope it gives for this life and the next.
But in this world, we so often walk in the way of the cross. We follow the crucified one. This perspective is vital to me in parish ministry and it is vital to any of us who work in caring professions or who find ourselves in a caring role we perhaps did not expect.

When we care for others there are days when, in one context or another, we are companion to someone's sorrow. We can be this companion because Christ has walked this way before us and he also walks this way beside us now. This knowledge gives comfort... strength and hope. It enables us to be companion to the sorrow, but not consumed by it. We can take on ashes without becoming ash ourselves. Here is what David Wade writes:

"... Almost eight and a half years after the event, the site of the World Trade Centre collapse remains a large hole in the ground. While this may indeed be a fitting symbol of all that tragedy represents, in fact it is greed, political posturing and infighting, human pettiness, and wrangling over insurance claims that has kept the site empty. As long as the address continues to be prime real estate, the nearly 3000 memories that linger there will remain dishonoured. Ashes.

Another grave was dug this week for a loved one gone from me. Jewellery companies would have us believe that diamonds, with their artificially inflated value, are the most exquisite expression of love on the planet. Yet as the dirt was placed over the body of my old friend, I felt that love itself is the most rare and precious commodity we can know. And in that sorrow, I know less of it now. Ashes.

As a young Christian, I was taught that our faith was about joy and triumph. That it was an ever-upward movement. Our worship reflected it. Our evangelism was fuelled by it. Now I look back and see that as folly, as mere ash. Christianity is about life. And life is often about sorrow. Disappointment. Fear. Loss. The unique call we receive as followers of the Crucified One is that we can become companions to the sorrow without being consumed by it. We can take on the ashes without becoming ash ourselves.

The message of the Cross is the same as the message of the Birth – Emmanuel -I am with you. Even in your poverty. Even in your suffering. Even in your dying. Never abandoned. Never alone.

May this joy of ashes be yours during this Lenten season."

Blessings

Dorothy