Remember you are dust - Lent, 2023
We begin Lent by looking back to the first book of the Bible, and the very first failure. We know the story: Adam and Eve disobey God and they eat the fruit that they have been told not to touch.
Reflection
As a result, they are cast out of the Garden of Eden, condemned to suffering and death.
Fast forward to today, Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. As the ash is placed on our foreheads in the shape of the cross, those words from Genesis are spoken: “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” It is a day to lament our disconnectedness from God. It begins a time where we consider those failures in our own lives which separate us from God today.
But the sign of the cross reminds us that in Jesus, our failure is overcome by God’s glory. God himself comes to make up the distance we put between him and us.
By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return.