Ash Wednesday

Millbrook will host an Ash Wednesday Service on March 5th at 6:00 p.m. The words of imposition are available below:

Ash Wednesday Words

We feasted for twelve days during Christmas. We feasted another seven weeks for Epiphany.  Tonight, we move into a season of fasting. Some will insist that fasting requires a sense of somberness. But I would argue that sometimes we have an excess of seriousness. I would suggest, instead, that in the fasting ahead, we are entering a season of simpleness. We are working to focus. We are working to reconnect with God. In limiting our extravagance, we open up room to see the beauty and power in our ordinary lives.

Tonight, we’ll impose ashes, and we’ll gather at a table. We hope to learn a little something about ourselves. We hope to find a permission or a grace, to wonder and wander in the season ahead. We want to make space to wonder aloud who God is.  And we want to wander about, noticing God’s creation around us. We hope our journey will steel us for the highs and lows of Easter.

Lent is also a season of repentance, a turning toward God. I don’t believe repentance means groveling to an angry God, or professing a sense of our deepest worthlessness. I am reminded of Luke’s gospel, and particularly the story of the prodigal sons. Yes, the younger brother runs off in a fit of wanderlust. And when he’s spent his money, and he’s living in a pigsty, he remembers the dignity, and authenticity, and generosity of his Daddy. And he turns around. And he heads home. And when his Daddy sees him on the horizon, his Daddy sprints to enfold his boy in his arms.

A little while later, the dutiful older brother seethes in anger – his little brother is getting a party for shirking responsibility. And it seems accountability goes unrewarded in his household. And in his rage, big brother storms out of the banquet hall. And his Daddy gently calls him back: “Don’t you know?  All that is mine is yours!!!”

We are not u-turning into the teeth of God, exposing our flank to a zapper and a flamethrower. We are being called home to a loving source. One who yearns for us, welcomes us, and celebrates us.

Good friends, may we find redemption in a return to our source!

The Dust!

A long time ago, but no so long ago that it couldn’t have happened yesterday, God pressed two caring hands into soft, black, fertile soil – good dirt as we might call it – and formed the first earth creatures. I imagine that God had the same hope we have each fall and spring when we break soil and fill the earth with various seeds and bulbs. From earth, from dirt, something will grow and mature that expresses the goodness of God. I believe God intends the expressions of human companionship – care, love, and stewardship – to extend the sensual beauty and sustenance of the plants and animals that filled the first garden. Dust is a good thing, y’all!

But the dirt, the dust, the ash we wear tonight can also be a tricky thing. Ash reminds us of our own mortality – we too, will join the other creatures and creations of the garden in returning, eventually, to the dirt. And yet, we also view the ash in light and with certain hope of resurrection. God’s dirt, God’s earth, God’s creation is beloved. The dust that fills God’s Earth is fertile ground for transformation. Old becomes new. Stubborn becomes changed. Broken becomes whole.

So…we invite you to receive the imposition of ashes, on your forehead, on your hand, or even in Spirit if that makes you most comfortable. May the ashes be for, you, a reminder of your value, of your belonging, of your potential, and ultimately, of God’s love for you. And may such a realization provoke connection, healing, and calling in the season to come.

Good friends, you are God’s beloved, created dust.

And to God’s beloved, created dust you shall return.

Imposition of Ashes

The Table!

One way we can think about Communion, is that during that first supper, Jesus invited a whole bunch of friends who bore the ashes. Were they perfect? No. Perfectly loved and perfectly created?  Yes!  Jesus said, “You are enough! Come and sit with me.” Jesus offers us the same invitation.

Words of Institution.

Friends, we come from a good source, and we’ll return to a good source.  And we are sustained by a table with effusive hospitality. Well-sourced, and well-fed, may we become an expression of the God-Stuff in the season ahead!

Amen.