ash wednesday

ash wednesday

Last night we prayed and asked God to reveal to us our sin. We wrote it down on scraps of paper. We prayed for forgiveness.

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."
1 John 1:9

We thanked God for his immeasurable love. We thanked Jesus for willingly, lovingly, mercifully dying on the cross for us, his enemies.

"The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against him;"Daniel 9:9

We asked God to remind us even more this season where we have turned from him, where the blackness lurks within us. To show us this so we can repent and follow Him anew. Today we will burn these scraps and rub on some of the ashes. A reminder that once our sin is forgiven for God it exists no more...

"I, even I, am he who blots out
your transgressions, for my own sake,
and remembers your sins no more.Isaiah 43:25

Ashes, a reminder of our humble beginnings as clods of dirt. Burning flames destroying the old, cleansing and making new.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!"
2 Corinthians 5:17

Ashes, reminding us of the blackness, the sorrow in which our sin dwells.

"For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins."
Colossians 1:13-14

We are headed through the sadness toward the bright hope of Jesus' resurrection.

"Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,"
Acts 3:19