Good morning…
In our backyard, remnants of old blend with green growth of new. Yesterday, I snapped a few photos capturing signs of death and rebirth coexisting in the garden. Now up in the middle of the night, I feel drawn to don my slippers, to grab a pair of scissors, and to snip off, one by one, the dry stalks left from last year. Old life has run its course; new life is emerging. I sense that each slender stalk might symbolize an outdated habit, belief, or relationship which has served me well in the past, but now whispers, “Please let me go.”
Might these dead sticks become kindling for whatever God fuels next?
Today marks a shift of seasons in the Christian church. We end the “Ordinary Time after Epiphany” and we begin the season of Lent. Lent is a self-reflective season when God-lovers prepare for Easter, in part, by remembering our human frailty and our undeniable mortality. Today, Ash Wednesday, many of us will receive an ashen symbol of the cross on our foreheads as a humble reminder . . . “for you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 3:19b, ESV).
If this is so, then what might we let go? Shame. Guilt. Doubt. Pride. Sorrow. Selfishness. The Big I must die. Might we cut away these brittle emotions, surrender them completely on the altar of prayer, and allow God to burn them into sacrificial ashes as this Lenten season begins?
Might old blessings which have run their course be cut away, let go, burned to ash, opening up breathing space for the fresh green growth of God?
…Sue…
