You are dust and to dust you shall return

Lent began this year on March 6 with Ash Wednesday. During the worship services, an ash cross, a sign of our mortality and our repentance, was marked on each person's forehead as the minister intoned the Genesis 3:8 declaration, "you are dust and to dust you shall return."

As a minister, I have received the ashes of Lent and have administered them to family members, friends, acquaintances, and strangers. It is difficult to say to a child, a teenager, a mother, a father, a grandparent and frail elders that they are mortal without being tempted to whisper, "It's OK; Easter is just around the corner."

Yet, I believe these cold-waters-in-the-face words are exactly what we all need to hear. I believe these words are calling us to be silent and actively listen for the voice of God and then do what we are called to do in order to maintain a right relationship with God and with our neighbors.

The Rt. Rev. J. Neil Alexander, the dean of the School of Theology at my alma mater wrote: "Hardly a day passes that someone doesn't comment to me about the troubled state of our nation and the world. From both sides of the political divide, from young to old and in between, there is clearly a sense of disorientation, unsettledness and even frustration. These feelings extend into the church."

I read his commentary the day after I had finished reading "When God is Silent," by Barbara Brown Taylor. She wrote that there is a famine in the land, not from a lack of food or water, but a famine of courageous words. She also named a survey of preachers asking them to name their greatest fears. The fear of public speaking outranked the fear of a debilitating condition and the fear of death. Preachers know that God's words have soul-shaking power and we know what a frightful gift it is. We pray for wisdom and courage. I have wondered if I am feeding the people with the food of the angels and are these words the best I can use to direct us to the nearer presence of God and divine truth? Are they words that can inflame the heart with love and cast away fear? Can they drive out the chaos of hate and prejudice and proclaim the dignity of every human being? Can we all preach courage gospel words that lift the spirit and the body to go forth with confidence and hope to the spiritual battlefront? Can we walk in love as God loves us (Ephesians 5:2) or do we desire to withhold our God-given love from others -- all the others?

St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 13:11 what could be said of our national condition: "When I was child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside childish ways."

Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.

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Ken Parks is the former rector of St. Theodore's Episcopal Church in Bella Vista. He can be reached by email to [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author.

Religion on 03/20/2019