MARCH 1, 2006 PASTOR SCOTT FULLER
Isaiah 58:1-12; Psalm 51:1-18; 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10; Matthew 6:1-6,16-21
Ashes, Ashes
Prepare our hearts, Lord, to receive your Word. Silence in us any voice but your own that in hearing we may believe and in believing we may obey your will revealed to us in Jesus Christ. Amen.
Dear friends in Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Ring around the rosy, pocket full of posy, ashes, ashes, we all fall down.
Does anyone know what this nursery rhyme/song/game is about?
Apparently, there’s a little controversy about its origins. Some people are certain that it’s a simple child’s game from 18th Century America. But others are sure that its roots are darker and run deeper, back, in fact, into the depths of the “Black Death” or terrible plague that nearly wiped out London in the year 1665. They explain it this way:
Ring around the rosy: refers to the plague’s red rash in the form of a ring.
Pocket full of posy: sweet flowers were believed to prevent its spread.
Ashes, ashes: from the cremation of all the dead bodies.
We all fall down: The death rate was > 60%! (rhymes.org.uk/ring_around_the_rosy.htm)
Being the “dark Lutheran” that I am, you can guess which source appeals to me – and not because I have a strong taste for the macabre. But because of the strong connection that I see between life…and death… and God…and those ever-present ashes.
Aph-ar is a Hebrew word that means “dry earth, dust or ashes.” The first place we see it is in Genesis 2:7 which reads Then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
The next time we see it is in Genesis 3:19b after God has punished Adam and Eve for their rebellion. Says the Lord, you are dust and to dust you shall return. It is a cycle of beginning and ending, being born and passing away, living and dying that is brought to completion when we stand at the graveside of those we love and hear those earthy, dusty, ashy words earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust…
What other negative things or feelings do ashes symbolize?
-destruction -grief -loss -frustration -pain
From the charred bits of a house that had been a home before it was destroyed by flames, to a barren wasteland that had been an alpine paradise before Mt. St. Helen’s exploded, ashes are at times all that is left when our hopes and dreams have been destroyed.
Can ashes symbolize something positive or potentially good?
-repentance (Jonah: Ninevite king/people) -renewal (after forest fire)
Speaking of Mt. St. Helen’s, our family visited the site seven years or so after it had erupted, destroying everything in the path of its blast. From a distance, even after that much time had passed, the land looked like a lunar landscape – all signs of life seemingly burned or blown away. Yet up close, down at ground level, we saw signs of life all over the place…little bugs and tiny plants doggedly pushing their way through the ash.
A similar sort of thing is true in our lives as well…tragedies take their toll: disappointment, destruction, disaster, divorce, disease, death, they leave us gasping and grasping for something to hold on to, singing, I suppose, in our own unique ways, ashes, ashes, we all fall down…
But the strange truth of our experience as children of God is that we are not left to wander through a wasteland of worry, a desert of disquiet, a place of pain on our own. Far from it. Sings the Psalmist from the depths of his depression, create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and sustain in me a willing spirit (Psalm 51:10-12).
Ashes, then, in the end are a sign of hope – not so much in our amazing ability to rebuild, regroup, recoup our losses… But that in the midst of this life in which we are so closely related to the earth, to ashes, to dust, God has reached, is reaching and will continue to reach out to us and hold us firm in those strong, loving hands. And even more than that, to celebrate God’s promise to daily breathe into us the breath of life…that we might live to love and serve our God and our neighbor. Amen.