Oreos Can’t Cut It

This sermon was preached at Canoe Ridge Lutheran Church, Decorah, Iowa on Ash Wednesday, March 6, 2019. It’s based on Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 and Psalm 51:1-4, 9-17. If you’d prefer to listen to it, find it at https://soundcloud.com/stacey-nalean-carlson.

Joel 2:1-2, 12-17

¹Blow the trumpet in Zion; sound the alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming, it is near—²a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness spread upon the mountains a great and powerful army comes; their like has never been from of old, nor will be again after them in ages to come.

¹²Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; ¹³rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing. ¹⁴Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord, your God?

¹⁵Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast; call a solemn assembly; ¹⁶gather the people. Sanctify the congregation; assemble the aged; gather the children, even infants at the breast. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her canopy. ¹⁷Between the vestibule and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep. Let them say, “Spare your people, O Lord, and do not make your heritage a mockery, a byword among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’ ”

Psalm 51:1-4, 9-17

¹Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; in your great compassion blot out my offenses. ²Wash me through and through from my wickedness, and cleanse me from my sin. ³For I know my offenses, and my sin is ever before me. ⁴Against you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are justified when you speak and right in your judgment.
⁹Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my wickedness. ¹⁰Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. ¹¹Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. ¹²Restore to me the joy of your salvation and sustain me with your bountiful Spirit. ¹³Let me teach your ways to offenders, and sinners shall be restored to you. ¹⁴Rescue me from bloodshed, O God of my salvation, and my tongue shall sing of your righteousness. ¹⁵O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise. ¹⁶For you take no delight in sacrifice, or I would give it. You are not pleased with burnt offering. ¹⁷The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit; a troubled and broken heart, O God, you will not despise.

Do we really need ashes on our foreheads to remind us we’re going to die?

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. As if we could forget.

As if tornadoes don’t appear out of nowhere and claim twenty-three lives. As if cancer doesn’t launch surprise attacks on those we know and love. As if we don’t quietly open the door and peek in on sleeping children to make sure they’re still breathing.

Daily, we are reminded of the fragility of life. So why this day to remember?

Do we really need to confess our sin in the presence of God and of one another?

In the words of the psalmist, I know my offenses and my sin is ever before me. We’re painfully aware of the hurt we’ve inflicted, of the disappointment we’ve caused, of our failures, of our regrets.

Why take this night to dwell in that brokenness, to look unwaveringly in the mirror?

If I had my way, I’d stay home and watch television. Maybe catch up on The Voice. Or start a new book, transport myself away from this endless winter. Or, better yet, celebrate every day as Fat Tuesday, and just keep on eating donuts and dark chocolate M&Ms, and maybe even Oreos (since Doug tells me today is National Oreo Day).

But the Spirit has called me here, despite my protests. Just as the Spirit has called you here tonight—the aged…the children, even infants at the breast.

In Wil Gafney’s beautiful commentary on tonight’s reading from Joel, she notes that Joel offers a familiar tender portrait of the God who draws us in, towards her: “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing” (2:13). Rahum [translated here as merciful] is the deep love that springs from the womb, no more separable than the heart is from heartache.¹

To be human is to experience heartache. We don’t need tonight to remind us of that. What we do need to be reminded of is God’s deep love. We need to remember that the God who birthed us—who breathed into dust the breath of life—loves us with a love that sin and death cannot erase.

The ashes on our foreheads tonight aren’t just a messy smudge or an indistinguishable shape. They form a cross.

We are not alone in the fear and loss that death creates. We are not alone in the shame and guilt our sin demands. We have a savior who went to the cross for us, whose death destroyed death, whose life gives us life, whose steadfast love and willingness to forgive frees us from shame and guilt to live lives of joyful witness to the goodness of God.

Yes, we do need to confess our sin in the presence of God and of one another, so that it no longer has power over us. Exposed to the light, it loses its ability to consume us.

And yes, we do need ashes on our foreheads—not to remind us that we’re going to die, but to remind us that we’re alive in Christ. And not even death, whenever it comes, can take that life from us.

Oreos can’t cut it. We need each other. We need ashes on our foreheads and have mercy on our lips. We need the womb-love of a God who checks to make sure we’re still breathing…and then fills our hearts and lungs with God’s own breath, breathing new life into all the dusty, broken bits of our lives.

I’ll close tonight with Jan Richardson’s words.²

So let us be marked

not for sorrow.

And let us be marked

not for shame.

Let us be marked

not for false humility

or for thinking

we are less

than we are

but for claiming

what God can do