Ash Wednesday

The first track on Sara Groves' newest album is entitled "Miracle" and the first line goes a little something like this, "Lay down your arms. Give up the fight. Quiet our hearts for a little while." I must have listened to this song a dozen times today trying to implement its lyrics.

We live in such a rat race of a society where it is good to be busy and very bad to be lazy. It seems that people are always trying to find ways to "unwind." We are pushed to our limits, both physically and emotionally. Even as a full time missionary/student ministry director, I feel pressure to perform well, live up to expectations, put in long hours, and far too often I ignore any idea of Sabbath or rest. There are days that I feel responsible for the overall well being of any and everybody I come in contact with. My high school and college career can be characterized by me trying to carry for others what they couldn't carry on their own - all the while not realizing that it was wearing me thinner and thinner. I was always the first to lend a hand, but always the last to ask for one myself.

As I look back through my journals from the past few years, I had regularly revisited the idea of taking a Sabbath - making time to rest in my relationship with the Lord - taking a day off and just resting in His presence. I would do it for a month and then quit, three weeks then quit. But isn't that the human condition? - great intentions, poor follow through. We've all been affected by that fraility of our flesh. Whether we have let ourselves down or been let down by someone else, at some point or another we have been let down. Let's face it, we are fleshy, imperfect creatures originally made of nothing but a little dust and a holy exhale.

That's what Ash Wednesday has reminded me - I'm jsut dust..just ash.

Pslam 103:13-16 reads as follows: "Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him. For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust. As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. When the wind has passed over it, it is no more, And its place acknowledges it no longer"

He is mindful that we are but dust. God knows our frailty. He knows the human condition and the need we feel to stay busy, be productive, and measure up. I am so glad that He knows my frame. He understands my weaknesses.

This lent season, may we remember our weaknesses. May we remember that we can't be everything for everybody. May we remember that the only difference between us and the the rest of creation is that holy exhale - the breath of heaven.

We are finite creatures. It's silly of us to function as if we were somehow infinite.

"Father, remind me that I am but dust. Remind me this lent season to lay down my arms, give up the fight, and quiet my heart for a while. Create in me a clean heart, O God and renew a right right spirit within me. - Amen