Welcome to Lent 2017

At my church tonight, we celebrated the intentional journey towards resurrection by receiving ashes on our foreheads. These ashes were made from last year's palm branches. By using palms from Palm Sunday, it is a reminder that we must not only rejoice of Jesus’ coming, but also acknowledge the fact that our sin made it necessary for him to die.

They have been drying in my garage all year. This morning I went to the back porch and I prayed over the dried palms. They were dead. Just like many of us feel today. Dried up. They had been alive and filled with joy, once. They had waved a great Hallelujah. They saw Jesus coming in Glory.

And then the heat of the summer came. They were separated from their life source. Their green turned brown and their once smooth branches were almost splintery. The added heat from the flame of fire turned them to dust. 

So, tonight we sat together because we need to know that this cycle of life and death is the depth of our humanity. We are invited to confess that together, to draw us into that reality. Because in death, we are invited into life.

Without Jesus, that is all we have - dust and ash. 

It is because of his life and death, we have been given a new, whole, redeemed life.

For me, this has become a sacred pilgrimage, because I need to be reminded that this life that I try to control and harness and manipulate is temporary. So, I pray for this season to be transformational. That in these 40 days, we will cry out to God in new and brave and real and personal and communal ways that will make the promise of redemption that much sweeter.