For I know my offenses, and my sin is ever before me...

The Rev. Kathi Johnson

A Ash Wednesday – March 5, 2014

Text: Psalm 51

Our Redeemer Lutheran Church, Grand Prairie, Texas

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It used to be that yards were surrounded by something called a chain-link fence. This was before the days of what we now call “privacy fences” – the tall slats of wood that shut out most of our view of whatever it is that is around us. With chain-link fences, it was all out there, for everyone to see.

And it was during this era that a French priest named Michel Quoist wrote a prayer using a chain-link fence as his inspiration:

“The Wire Fence”

The wires are holding hands around the holes;

To avoid breaking the ring, they hold tight the neighboring wrist,

And it’s thus that with holes they make a fence.

Lord, there are lots of holes in my life.

There are some in the lives of my neighbors.

But if you wish, we shall hold hands,

We shall hold very tight,

And together we shall make a fine roll of fence to adorn Paradise.

“Lord, there are lots of holes in my life…” he says. And he’s right – the holes are there. As much as I want to think of myself and my life as being totally put together and completely intact, the holes are there – and more often than not, just like a chain-link fence, the holes are bigger than the wires that hold the fence together.

For me, it calls to mind the psalm we read and sang at the beginning of our service – Psalm 51 – a psalm of lament, written as a confession of sin. In this psalm, the writer is basically saying the same thing to God: “Lord, there are lots of holes in my life…”

Except the psalmist puts it this way: “I know my offenses, and my sin is ever before me…”

We use this psalm on Ash Wednesday – the beginning of Lent – to re-orient us each year. Because Lent is meant to be a time of special self-examination and repentance, this psalm re-orients us to a place where we remember the holes in our own lives – we remember that we are sinful – we remember that we are dust, and to dust we shall return.

It can be very hard for us to be honest about our own sinful condition and the sin that surrounds us. It can be very hard for us to say that all out loud – to cry out to God before others: “I know my offenses, and my sin is ever before me!” Our sin has been with us for a long, long time. And our sin weighs on us – it holds us down – it tries to kill us with its heaviness.

So here we come to another Ash Wednesday. Another year in which we receive ashes on our heads. It is a foreign act to us – to receive ashes on our heads. It is something done very cleanly and neatly in church once a year. But it used to be that whenever someone wanted to show they were very sad, or show they were very sorry, they’d put ashes on their heads and they’d dress in rough cloth – they would wear outward signs of their inner sorrow. And so that is what we will do today – we will wear an outward sign of our inner sorrow, our inner grief for our own sins and the sins of others, the sins that surround us and impact us every day of our lives.

The ashes that we receive today will be made in the sign of a cross. And it is this sign – the cross – that reminds us that God does have mercy on us, according to his steadfast love. In God’s great compassion, he blots out our offenses. The powerful love of Christ – shown by his cross – it was marked on us at baptism – it marks us today – it marks us forever.

Because of this love, we can pray: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence and take not your Holy Spirit from me.”

Amen.

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