Ash Wednesday 2017
Sermon preached at St Mary’s in the Baum on 1stMarch 2017
There’s not too much dust here in this Church. It’s kept pretty clean and tidy. But there is dust everywhere… of course.
Today in our liturgy of Ash Wednesday we shall hear the words:
“Dust you are and to dust you shall return”
Dust is seen as the enemy of the house proud, it gets everywhere.
Are you wining your battle with dust ?
Do you have a Dust Buster – one of those little Hoovers or..
have you given up. Perhaps you only dust when family or the Vicar visits !
Dust and Soil have many ingredients. These include animal, vegetable, organic, inorganic. Dust has a lot of pollution bits in. Smoke particles.
We are not just thinking about house dust, we are thinking about soil. Soil is again something that develops from waste, rotted matter.
One day we shall return to the soil. One way or the other we shall be pushing up the daisies. I don't use that term flippantly – we shall play our part in the next phase of life.
Soil is a magical thing. It covers most of the earth, contains minerals, essential for the growth of plants. We would not be here without soil.
And already by thinking about soil we have a clue about the story of Lent and Easter. There will be death and there will be new life
Today we live in a world of virtual reality. We complain about the young people with their PlayStation and Pokemon Go… but is it really that we are in touch with reality.
We filter our news through our favourite newspapers and meet people who agree with us. We keep ourselves away from dirt and difficulty.
Our Bible stories today tell us of people who believe they are too good to get any dust or dirt on their hands. People who think they are above all that.
Hindu religion in India
Thus it was for the people that Isaiah tells us about. I bet they didn't lower themselves to do any cleaning up.
We hear that they are fighting. Not sharing their food with the hungry . They could give a fig for justice.
They think they are A class and everyone else C class
Mathew tells us about a similar type of Character. Pious and self promoting and greedy. They are storing up treasure for themselves while making themselves look all religious.
They have pushed all the dust and dirt away from themselves. Left it for others to clean up.
It's sobering to be told that we shall return to dust.
Lent is a time of stripping away, of bringing us down to earth.
We get airs and graces and we – like the people Mathew and Isaiah are writing about – think we are like Gods we live for ever and we don't need others.
There's something very wonderful too about soil. It gives life. It has death and the promise of new life all bound up. So with this time in the Church's calendar. We journey through death to new life.
Let's remember that we are but dust
Let's turn away from the sin that divides us from our brothers and sisters in need
Let's turn again to the God who makes things grow in the fertile soil of our human nature
Mark Coleman