Ash Wednesday: Dust

'Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.'

It is a day of turning.
No.
It is a day of returning;
changing direction,
and purposefully,
step by step,
walking toward, not from, God.
This is a day of new beginnings,
putting down a marker
where we start afresh,
where we wander into wilderness
following footsteps that have walked this way before -
travelling with the great crowd of saints
following the way of Jesus.

It is a day of dust,
of ashes,
of remembering our mortality;
of remembering who we are
and whose we are.
Today reminds us that we are not gods,
but we are God's:
beloved.
The sign of mortality and love and belonging
smeared in ash upon us.

It is a symbol.
Yes.
It is also a promise;
of cleansing,
of mercy,
of showing to the world that this
is not all there is
and that death does not have the final say.
In the mark of ashes
the power of resurrection
waits to be rebirthed.