ash wednesday sermon on dirt

Dirt

In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth,

the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep,

while the breath of God swept over the face of the waters.

Then God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light.

And later on, the Lord God said, “Let there be dirt”; and there was dirt.

And then the Lord God sculpted a person from the dirt

—scripture says “dust” but we all know

that’s a pretty way of saying mud—

and the Lord God breathed into the dirt-creature’s nostrils

the breath of life;

and the mud became human.

Every one of us is dirty—that is, made of salt and carbon and bits of things

         We are not so different in our essential makeup from a potato or an earthworm

The dust in our houses is, in fact, dirt.

skin and dirt from our shoes and bits of food and hair.

Sure, we’re made of star-stuff like the astrophysicists say

and that’s beautiful but you know what star-stuff is?

Dirt only dressed up in it’s Sunday-best.

         And this is not meant for you to beat your breast

and cry “I am a worm and no man!” as the Psalmist does

         nor is this about a false sense of humility:

                  you know the old joke of the woman who prays to God,

“I’m nothing, I’m nothing!” and another woman hears

and says “Look who thinks he’s nothing.”

         This essential dirtiness is about recognizing where we come from

                  It’s about knowing that God’s breath in our lungs

is the only thing holding us together:

not our 401Ks or stock options,

not our nice house in the suburbs,

not our kids who mostly meet our expectations for goodness,

not the amount of work we do for pay or not

                  we are, in some literal and poetic way, made entirely of dirt and breath

of course, we all know about our essential dirtiness in the other sense

         not just our sexual appetites but all of our dirtiness

         the Episcopal Ash Wednesday rite includes

an extensive Litany of Penitence and lists those dirty parts of us

we’d rather keep hidden

                  our unfaithfulness, pride, hypocrisy, and impatience

                  our self-indulgent appetites and exploitation

                  our anger at our own frustration, our envy of those more fortunate

                  our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts and our dishonesty

                  our negligence in prayer and worship

                  and my favorite, my most favorite one

                           because it’s about our failure to recognize

our innate blessedness and giftedness

                  we confess our failure to commend the faith that is in us

I don’t really want you to see those parts of me.

I hide behind a sparkling clean wall of competence

so you won’t see those parts.

Have you got that wall, too?

         Every one of us is made of dust and to dust we shall return.

         Every one of us is made of dirt

and we spend a lot of time shellacking it so that we won’t return to dirt.

And we spend a lot of time examining the folks we meet

for chinks in their shellack armor,

looking for their innate dirtiness

—this is called gossip, this is called self-righteousness,

this is called prying

This dirtiness we try to hide is the very same stuff that grows our vegetables.

         The dirt that we’re made of is the very same stuff

that supports our feet and houses.

         The dirt that is us is the very same stuff

that children build forts or make clown makeup with.

         The dirt that we try to sweep out of the living room for the umpteenth time

is a reminder of whose artwork we are.

God chose that dirt,

God scooped it up and mixed it with water and made us

and so we’re both the most humble, dirtiest creatures imaginable

and also the most beloved.

In a bit, we’re going to smear some more dirt on your foreheads.

We’ll call it dust and we’ll tell you to remember your mortality,

remember that it’s only God’s breath holding you together.

“Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.”

Maybe you’re not really ready for that.

And maybe you’re listening to me now and thinking

“it’s no big deal, just a smudge of ashes”

or maybe you’re thinking “Lord I believe, help my unbelief” as did Thomas

no matter where you are right now,

I invite you to begin releasing your hold on that clean wall

keeping the rest of us out

         sit comfortably in your pew

         maybe close your eyes

         and rest your hands on the tops of your knees, palm up.

Close your eyes and clench your hands up tight.

Imagine all the pressures and worries and tensions

you are carrying as you sit here now.

Then

in your own time

gently turn your hands over so that they are facing down.

Imagine God’s hands underneath yours

and slowly open your hands

so that the things you are carrying

fall into God’s hands.

         Allow your dirt-self to show.

You may wish to repeat this several times.

Then turn your hands face up,

but this time with the palms open

and ask God’s Spirit,

God’s breath,

to fill you afresh.[1]

Be gentle with yourselves.

Remember that your dirt-self is both a blessing and a challenge.

Remember that you are dirt, and to dirt you shall return.

Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

Amen.

---

[1] Stolen from the SOS community and then modified.

retreat address 3: Priscilla and Phoebe, Paul's Church Ladies

Growing up, I always thought of the church ladies in my Dad’s churches like the Dowager Countess in Downton Abbey—Maggie Smith at her accomplished, pinched, disapproving best.

After a while, I began to pay more attention; I came to know that they were sweet and caring and committed to the Church. They were the ones crawling around on their knees with brown paper and an iron to get the wax out of the carpet. They were the ones bringing casseroles when someone was sick. They were the ones praying hard every night for me and the other teenagers and for all I know the power of their prayers is why nothing really bad happened to us. They were the ones holding the fragile, conglomeration of broken people we called the church together.

We so often think of the early church as the domain of the 12 male apostles and of Paul. They’re the ones named in the Gospels, they’re the ones asking the often dumb questions, they’re the ones present at the resurrection on the beach or in the upper room. But at the very least, who cooked for them? You know as well as I that Mary Magdalene and others were around Jesus and the 12 constantly. Mary Magdalene is the only one in all four Gospels to consistently be present at the empty tomb. Of course there were women in the early church, we say to ourselves, but what does that mean? Were they getting wax out of folks’ robes or were any of them actively spreading the Gospel like Peter and Paul?

Once upon a time, there were two women named Priscilla and Phoebe. They didn’t meet and probably didn’t even know of each other’s existence. They were two of many women working for the Kingdom of God and loving their neighbors. Priscilla and Phoebe stand in for Junia, Julia, Tryphena, Tryphosa, Mary, Persis, Chloe, Euodia and Synthyche and many others. Priscilla and Phoebe are the Eunices and Carols and Nancyes who I once thought of as terrifying and who hold us together.

Priscilla was married to Aquila and this rhyming couplet traveled with St. Paul around bits of the Mediterranean. They made tents with Paul and shared the Good News of Jesus with the folks they met. We don’t know much more than that about Priscilla and Aquila but I like to imagine them arguing theology with Jews and Gentiles alike right alongside Paul. “Of course we are justified by grace alone,” Priscilla would say, “look at my husband Aquila. He’s a good man, but every time he doesn’t put his dishes in the dishwasher is a point against him. There’s no way to recover from that.” Or arguing with Paul the way I wish I could. “Brother Paul,” she might have said, “What’s this about it being shameful for a woman to speak in church?”

But there are no heroic deeds attributed to Priscilla, no transcendent appearances of God in the desert. She went about her life, praying and cooking, speaking and tentmaking.

Now Phoebe was Paul’s patron—one of those women whose names are written in huge typeface on the banners at fundraising galas. You know, “Angel Donors: Dr. and Mrs. Charles Smitherington” or similar. She and others provided food and lodging to these fascinating, difficult, spiritual men. They found ways to be near them, to hear their parables and arguments. Phoebe used what she had to support these traveling preachers and, by extension, support the men and women who came to hear them.

Phoebe was Paul’s benefactor and, it turns out, was a deacon herself. She held the same office that one of Paul’s closest lieutenants Timothy did—diakonos or servant. The same thing even that Paul called himself. These three were servants of God, servants of the people they preached to, servants in both action and title. Phoebe, it turns out, is the only woman in scripture to bear that title, though I doubt very much that she was the only woman. When Paul wrote to Timothy, he spilled a lot of ink describing the conduct of deacons—their honesty, generosity, sobriety and all—and wrote specifically that women in that role ought follow the same conduct.

Phoebe was one of this company of faithful leaders. She sat with other women and heard their joys and sorrows. She heard their confessions. At their baptisms, Phoebe was there to anoint them with the cross of Christ. Deacon Phoebe had only a brief mention in scripture but was remembered long after her death. Three hundred years later, her name was invoked on another woman deacon’s grave stone.

But there are no heroic deeds attributed to Phoebe, no transcendent appearances of God in the desert. She went about her life, praying and benefacting, speaking and listening.

And maybe there are no heroic deeds attributed to you or me. We go about our lives—taking kids or grandkids to music lessons, doing the laundry, taking out the trash, going to work or ironing the linens at church. We don’t often have burning-bush moments, but maybe that’s not because they don’t happen but because we’re not really present to see them.

Kathleen Norris writes that one of her first experiences in an Episcopal church made her giggle with recognition. She watched as everyone filed up to receive communion and then as the priest took water and washed the dishes in front of everyone. Perhaps this is not a tradition at Prince of Peace—the priest drinks the remaining wine, pours water onto the plate and into the cup and then drinks that as well. It’s not a real dishwashing, of course, but is symbolic. And Kathleen Norris was delighted—that in the midst of something as holy and centering as communion, there was the boring, everydayness.

One of the places I find the most spiritual focus is in hanging laundry out to dry on my clothesline. I have one of those umbrella-dryers that spins in the wind. I take a couple of loads out and stand in the sunlight hanging diapers and shirts and thinking about God. It’s the most prosaic thing in the world and yet the most transcendent.

Priscilla and Phoebe may not have looked like burning bushes, but their hearts and lives were aflame with the Spirit.

*       *       *

Questions for conversation:

·      What stood out for you in Priscilla and Phoebe’s stories?

Share a story about a woman who has given you much, to whom you are greatly indebted.

retreat address 2: Deborah and Jael, Women on Top

Once upon a time, there were judges in Israel. This was before there were kings but after God created the world, you understand, so they were not as domesticated as Solomon or David but were mighty to behold. Sampson was a judge—all raw power and hair he was. And Ehud was a great warrior who stabbed one enemy so that his sword arm was swallowed up by the man’s belly. And Jephthah—ah, Jephthah. He was a soldier’s soldier that one—if only he hadn’t made a fool’s bargain and sacrificed his daughter. But of all these and many more, the greatest was Deborah.

Deborah was married to a man named Lappidoh which means spirited or fierce. Or else Lappidoh was a nickname meaning spirited or fierce. No one really knew. And Deborah, the Wife of Ferocity, sat under a tree at the outskirts of town. She sat there and saw the blue of the sky. She sat there and saw clouds like paste scraped across it. She sat there under the tree and saw the people coming to her with their tribulations and she saw the truth of their hearts. She sat there under the tree—which came to be known as Deborah’s Tree, if you must know—she sat there and saw the breath of God in each person, saw their passions and their flaws. Deborah sat there under her tree and loved the people. She sat, watching, listening, advising. And she heard the voice of God.

And one day she called the general of the army to her. She watched him come, she saw his passions and his flaws. “General Barak” said Deborah the wife of Ferocity, “God has a word to speak to you. God says to get your army in gear and go to Mount Tabor and fight the horde of Sisera. God says you will fight and you will win.”

And General Barak said to Deborah, “Will you come with me?” for he was brave, but not as brave as Deborah the Wife of Ferocity. “If you go with me,” he said, “I will go. But if you do not, I will not go.”

And General Barak hung his head and traced circles in the dirt with his foot like a little boy.

And Deborah looked at Barak and knew his heart and she sighed. Deborah said “I will indeed go with you, General Barak, but you’d better get ready for disappointment. You’ll win, but it won’t be because of you. Triumph will be because of a woman. You got that?”

So they went to the battlefield with their 10,000 soldiers and behold there was Sisera and all his glorious army with 900 iron chariots—think the climactic battle of Lord of the Rings at Pelennor Fields only with fewer trolls and orcs. And the Israelites looked at the army of Sisera and were afraid.

But Deborah the wife of Ferocity said to General Barak, “Get up! God is giving Sisera and all his army into your hand. God is your front line and your rear guard. Go, fight, win!” So they marched forward and saw Sisera’s army and Sisera’s army saw them.

They watched each other, saw how many soldiers were on each side, saw that the God of Israel was indeed with Israel. And Sisera’s army panicked—horses rearing and trampling, soldiers fleeing, and no officers able to form order. The Great and Terrible General Sisera was seen leaping from his own chariot and running away on foot like a scaredy-cat.

Deborah the Wife of Ferocity may or may not have rolled her eyes.

And suddenly General Barak had the courage of his convictions and called to his small army to pursue the great host of Sisera’s army and cut them down. Every last warrior of the enemies of Israel died by the sword of Barak’s army.

Deborah the Wife of Ferocity may or may not have had a gleam in her eyes.

Now you may well think that the glory of this story belongs to Deborah, the warrior woman. But there’s more to the story.

Sisera himself, great and terrible general of the bad guy army, had escaped the wholesale slaughter of his troops. He’d run away with his tail between his legs. And he’d run towards a tent-city that he knew was on his side, hoping to hide himself in their midst.

“Pssst” he heard and he looked and saw a woman gesturing him into her tent. In relief, Sisera snuck into the darkness.

Jael was the woman’s name and she had been sitting at the entrance to her tent, watching and waiting. She sat there and saw the blue of the sky. She sat there and saw clouds like paste scraped across it. She sat there in front of the tent and saw the people coming and she saw the truth of their hearts. Did she hear the voice of God telling her Sisera was coming? Why did she wait for this man and for what? No one knew. Jael was married to a man named Heber. His name might also have meant Ferocity for all we know, because here is what she did. Sisera the Great and Terrible was also Sisera the Fearful and Exhausted so he asked for some water. Jael instead gave him fresh milk to slake his thirst, like your mother might have given you before you went to bed, a soothing gesture. Sisera may or may not have noticed and he drank the milk down. His exhaustion hit him and he thought, “I’ll sort this Barak and Deborah thing out tomorrow when I’m rested” and he lay down to sleep. Just before falling asleep in the tent of this obviously trustworthy and tasteful woman, Sisera told her to lie if anyone asked if he was there. As his eyes drifted closed, Jael, the wife of Heber, picked up a tent-peg. And she picked up a hammer. And she laid the tentpeg against Sisera’s temple and gave it such a mighty blow with the hammer that it lodged in the ground beneath Sisera’s head.

And Jael, the wife of Ferocity went outside her tent to wait for whomever would come. And she may or may not have pondered all the deeds of Sisera which led her to this moment.

Barak, the Newly Great and Terrible came into the camp and Jael rose to meet him. She said, “come into my tent”—a terrifying statement if you know what’s inside—but Barak didn’t and he went and saw his enemy nailed to the ground. And Barak may or may not have marveled at the deeds of women.

He also may or may not have thrown up.

Deborah and Jael, the wives of Ferocity, the wives of Necessity and of Wisdom lived, if not happily ever after, then content, aware of the parts they played in the great story God was telling with Israel.

Deborah and Jael live on in Afghanistan where women teach their children history and faith and how to protect their families. They live on in India where women fight off rapists. They live on in Kenya where women plant trees in defiance of the government’s edict that women aren’t allowed to and the trees won’t make any difference anyway. Deborah and Jael live on in us when we call upon our own Ferocity to see the breath of God in each person, to see their passions and their flaws. When we sit, watching, listening, waiting, we, too, can hear the voice of God.

*       *       *

Questions for conversation:

·      What stood out for you in Deborah’s and Jael’s story?

Share a story about a time you stood up for someone—what happened? How anxious or fierce did you feel? Where was God in that moment? How did you know you needed to confront the situation? What did you learn?