Ash Wednesday: Make Your Plans

Devotion by: Pastor Scott McAnally

Joel 2:12-18

Yet even now, says the LORD,
return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
rend 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.
Who 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?

Blow the trumpet in Zion;
sanctify a fast;
call a solemn assembly;
gather 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.

Between 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?” ’
God’s Response and Promise

Then the LORD became jealous for his land,
and had pity on his people.

‘Return to the Lord Your God, for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.’ These words may seem familiar this time of year. They are the words we sing in Lent, in place of the ‘Alleluias’, as we anticipate hearing the good news of the Gospel. These are the words we sing as we prepare to hear a teaching about or from Jesus. Essentially we’re saying, ‘drop everything you are doing, because we are going to hear about how gracious and merciful God is.’

Sadly, because we are sinners, we don’t drop everything. And today we are reminded of that with a smudge of ashes, of a ‘return’ we will all face one day. We hear these words as the ashes are smudged on our foreheads: ‘Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’

And so for 40 days plus Sundays, we will sit with ashes and dust and sing these words from Joel. Lent is about returning, about dropping everything, so that we can once again hear what God is doing for us. We drop everything to hear God’s calling for us to love others. We drop coins in a box so that others halfway around the world may taste God’s grace in a meal. We drop everything to once again hear the story of Jesus, who dropped everything for you and me, took up the cross and went to Calvary’s Hill.

So, in dropping everything, what will you take up? It will be different for each of us, and at times may seem ardent. But know that you are being prayed for. May you discover anew this Lent the grace and mercy of a God who loves you, who is slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. God bless your Lenten Journey.

PRAYER: Merciful God, accompany our journey through these forty days. Renew us in the gift of baptism, that we may provide for those who are poor, pray for those in need, fast from self-indulgence; and above all, that we may find our treasure in the life of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.