Dust! We live in dust!
Annie and I have lived on a dirt road for nearly 30 years, dust is a way of life. Our daily lives are found and lived in the midst of dust. My Grandparents spoke of the “dust bowl” years. Years filled with nothing but dust.
Some lives, some generations have more dust than others, but we all have it… we can’t really escape it. We walk on it…. we try to vacuum it away…we work hard to limit it’s existence in our homes… and yet are lives are marked by it.
God created us from dust and it is to dust that we will return. He breathed His very life into dust. We are dust filled with God’s life giving breath, nothing more and nothing less.
Ash Wednesday reminds us that we are dust. Dust that has been blessed with life. Dust that has been given value and worth. Dust that is no longer mere dust, dust revealing life.
Today we will pause and remember. We will “remember” the glorious gift of life that we have received. We will begin a journey of “repentance”. A pilgrimage of “turning” back towards the grace that gives and continues to give this dust of ours life. And we will “recover” the joy of “being.” Being alive in this dust.
Yes, life is found in the dust. Daily living dependent upon His breath!
Oh Glorious One, come and breathe afresh in this thy Holy Dust.
