Dust. In the creation story, that’s how we begin. As dust. And not the sort of dust we’ll get on our faces tonight, but the sort that flies up in the air when you bang together chalkboard erasers. Light, fluffy, feathery stuff that’s easy to sneeze at. Scientists will tell you now that we’re made of stardust, and I’m not going to contradict them on that one. As old as the universe is, as immensely vast and diverse and interconnected, I have no qualms saying that we’re made of stardust. And the dust of dinosaurs. And of the dust of our parents. We are dust, and to dust we shall return, each and every living thing among us.
We just don’t usually announce our mortality to the world. It’s a sign of proper upbringing to wash behind our ears, scrub our fingernails, and have a properly cleaned shirt on for church. Not usually the place we go to get smudges on our faces. It’s how we separate the working class from the upper class. Manners and cleanliness, which is next to godliness. Or is it?
I’m not saying we ought to give up hygiene for Lent. I do not want to deny a hot bath to someone on days as snowy and cold as we’ve been having. But the fact of Jesus Christ is not that cleanliness is next to godliness, but that God is next to us. Jesus didn’t come down the mountain and hover just a centimeter above the ground his entire life. He was born in a cave surrounded by piles of animal feed, before and after it had been digested. He, too, was a dustling, with skin and fingernails, hair and sinuses, intestines and kneecaps. He who is God voluntarily took on our mortality - so why do we keep running from it?
To celebrate finishing my taxes, I got myself this lovely new toy, a FitBit Charge. It counts my steps every day, monitors my sleep each night, syncs with my phone to help me track what I eat and how often I go to the gym, and, the best part, it’s also a watch! With this lovely device I can earn wellness dollars through our ELCA health plan to help me pay for basic doctor, dentist, and medication fees, as they come up through the year. It’s here to improve my quality of living. To help me lose those pesky extra pounds and make the most of every step every day. Or something like that. But I’ll tell you one thing they’ll never invent a new tech toy for - keeping me from dying one day. Because no matter what I do to keep track of my health, no matter what vitamins, exercise, or care crossing the street, I am made of dust, and I will some day die. No idea when or what from. My next door neighbor dropped dead of a heart attack in his mid-40s. My grandfather had a heart so strong he lived much longer than the doctors thought he would once his Parkinsons took its final hold. It’s a mystery, what keeps us alive, why our hearts start beating and keep beating after the beatings they take. Loss and joy, birthdays and breakups, worry and expectation, all parts of life which both add to and take a toll on us.
I don’t say this to frighten you. Just to remind us all of what we already know - when it comes down to it, there is nothing that can ultimately keep anyone from dying, no amount of money, no club membership, no skin color, nationality, or political party. We are all the same. We are all mortal.
There was a king who wanted from his wise counselors a phrase he could wear on a ring which would at once keep him humble and keep him encouraged. The counselors conferred and brought him his ring. It read: “This, too, shall pass.” And it shall. Whatever pleasure, whatever pain, whatever hunger, whatever abundance, the constant which remains the same is that everything is always changing.
We are still dust. We will once again become dust. Specks. Grains of sand. Stars in the sky. Made out of the same stuff as Jesus Christ himself who came to get dusty with us. Who mixed up the dust with the blood, sweat, and tears of living. Who first breathed into dust, in the garden of creation, that Spirit which animates all life.
Our Sundays in Lent will be focusing on PRAYING. I’ve hung the word on our back wall, with each week’s particular theme written on each letter. We’re going to be practicing different types of prayers, different postures, different voices. Because praying is relationship with God. Sometimes we do all the talking, sometimes all we hear is silence, sometimes we feel a prayer or its answer in our bones. As dustlings, we are already living, breathing, prayers, because that creation story in the garden is one where God breathes life into the dust so that we can live. God breathes God’s Self into us to bring us to life. Just by existing, we are prayer, we are relationship with God, because God lives and moves in and around us.
This evening we are marked with the dusty cross, which begins our Lenten journey, and the other end of the story will meet us in 40 days at Maundy Thursday, when Jesus washes the disciples’ feet and when we hear God’s word of forgiveness and feel it in the healing oil of another cross on our foreheads. This talk of dying is just the beginning of the journey into new life. Like a caterpillar entering its cocoon, we enter into Lent with all signs pointing to death, but trusting that we will emerge as something new. And we will. Jesus entered the wilderness and emerged proclaiming that the kingdom of God has come near. We enter the wilderness with Jesus and find that Kingdom of God already breathing and alive within us. For we are God’s very own dust.
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