Peter K. Perry
Prescott United Methodist Church
Prescott, Arizona USA
mailto:pkperry@cableone.net
http://www.prescottumc.com


Ash Wednesday Message for March 8, 2000
Prescott United Methodist Church
Peter K. Perry

Holiday or Holy Day?  Clearly, Ash Wednesday is not 
a holiday.  None of us got the day off.  I doubt 
anyone around the country planned a party with an 
Ash Wednesday theme.  No Ash Wednesday BBQs or swim 
parties.  No Ash Wednesday three day weekends and 
probably very few Ash Wednesday gifts have been given.  
Holiday, no, but Holy Day, yes.  For this day marks 
the beginning of the season of Lent, the 40 days, 
not counting Sundays that precede Easter.

A former Trappist monk remembers Ash Wednesdays at 
the Abbey of Our Lady of the Holy Trinity monastery 
in Huntsville.  He remembers how the monks would 
walk barefoot through the stone church, keeping time 
to Gregorian chants, marching eventually into the 
old church where they received a daub of ashes on 
their foreheads - a visual reminder of their need 
for repentance.  He said, "It was cold at this time 
of year.  You would try to step in the spots where 
someone had stepped before, to feel some warmth." 
(Fr. Thomas Culleton, quoted in Salt Lake City 
Tribune, February 8, 1997)

Cold is a good adjective to describe this day, 
though we have the furnace turned up and all of 
our recent snow has melted.  It is a cold day 
spiritually, as we confront the darker side of our 
humanity...our sin...our need for repentance.  It 
can be very cold in our souls until we do this 
thing, this coming face-to-face with darkness, 
with despair, with death.  But thankfully, we do 
not journey through this day, and other days like 
it, alone.  There are others who have gone before 
us and in their footsteps we do find some warmth, 
some direction.

One of my books describes this season in its title: 
From Ashes to Fire. Beginning tonight, we step out 
on the cold stone floor of that place in our souls 
where we meet God, in the midst of ashes and 
repentance, undertaking a journey that will lead us 
through the days of Lenten preparation, into a week 
called Holy, to the glorious new day of Easter, and 
on to the fires of Pentecost and the burning promise 
of God's eternal presence in our lives...from ashes 
to fire.

Have any of you ever stood in the ruins of a burned 
out building?  When I was boy, the home of a neighbor 
a block away from ours burned to the ground. The 
trees all around were scorched.  The grass was brown.  
A few blackened timbers stood near the back of the 
house, and the remains of the cast iron plumbing 
system rose out of the ashes.  The day after the 
fire, as I walked to school with a friend, we saw 
the woman who had lived there, standing in the midst 
of what had once been her home, weeping and wondering 
aloud what would become of her and her family.  As 
she gazed at the ruins of her life, she despaired.  
But her husband was comforting her.  "We can rebuild," 
he said.  And they did.  One year later, a beautiful 
new home graced that lot. And the home they built was 
built around a massive stone fireplace.  I wonder... 
Did the woman and her husband and their children 
sit around that fireplace on winter nights, look at 
the dancing flames on the logs they were burning, 
and remember the ashes?

Ash Wednesday is a day when we say to God, "Here I am! 
Imperfect, incomplete, weak and broken, sorrowful and 
mourning.  Here I am! Sinner and saint all rolled into 
one.  Here I am! Frightened and needy and uncertain. 
Here I am! Confessing and repentant, and hesitantly 
hopeful.  Here I am! In the midst of ashes, cold, 
wasted, wanting.  Here I am!  Looking for the fire of 
hope, the fire of forgiveness, the fire of love, the 
fire of salvation. 

Our journey begins tonight, when we say to God, "Here I am! 
Mold me, make me, create in a new heart in me."  We 
come to the altar to make our confession, to receive 
God's promise, to step out in faith that Christ walks 
with us, that the Spirit will guide us, and that God's 
love for us can rise up from the dark and ashes of 
Wednesday to become the bright and glorious day of 
Easter and the burning fire of Pentecost.

Thomas Carlyle once said, "Of all acts of man repentance 
is the most divine. The greatest of all faults is to be 
conscious of none."  God calls us on this night to 
repentance.  It is a divine thing we do, but our fear 
is that God will reject us for our sins.  Hear the 
promise! "Nothing can separate us from the love of God 
in Christ Jesus! Nothing!

My friend Bass Mitchell remembers helping his grandfather 
on his farm.  One of his jobs was to carry water from the 
spring to the house. Bass says, 

        I would put a pole across a shoulders and a bucket 
on each end. The house was a good distance away and the 
first time I tried this, I just could not make it. The 
buckets were too heavy. And I'll never forget my grandfather 
coming out, taking the pole and placing it on his strong 
shoulders, then carrying them for me. It sure felt good to 
get rid of those heavy buckets.

Well, folks, that's the way it is here tonight on Ash 
Wednesday.  The burden we bear may seem heavy, but God 
is here to carry it for us.  Just bring it to the altar 
and let him take up the weight.  There's not a one of us 
here who is not bearing a burden of sin that God can lighten.  
Come to the altar tonight. Come and give God your burden, 
and take away just an ashen mark, a symbol of God's love 
for you.  Amen.