You are dust

I love dirt.

This deep love of soil and grit and regarding it as sacred comes, I think, from being from a farm that has been in our family for more than 120 years. The dirt gives us what we need, and it provides a place that is ours, lets us reside on it and work with it to create goodness, sustenance, life. It connects us to all who have come before us whom we have loved and who have loved us. It nurtures, it supports, it is.

In these ways, it is much like God. It reflects to me our Creator.

Perhaps that is why, then, each year on Ash Wednesday, these words murmured to me by a member of my Body mean so much to me: "Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return." The person says it as I feel their thumb wipe ashes onto my forehead in the shape of a cross. The words echo in my mind as I make the trek back to my seat, the humble truth of my identity on my forehead. The other members of my Body with their ash crosses look at me, and I look back. We look at each other, seeing each other for who we are: humans marked by divinity. Divinity marked by humanity.

This is the divine exchange we are a part of. This is the fate of my humanity and divinity, these good gifts I have been given: to be from the earth and to return to it. This is the fate of my humanity and divinity, these good gifts I have been given: to be from God and to return to God. My life and my self matter deeply, and yet, this body will return to the earth. Until it is resurrected, it will again become dirt, one of the the most humble and important gifts our Father has given us.

Dirt lays itself down for us so we can walk on it and build on it and live on it. It even lets us destroy it. Most of the time, we don't notice it doing this for us, until by our own fault we get it on our shirt or pants that for some reason are usually white and finally decide to notice it in order to complain about it.

But despite our callousness, dirt is always being for us. This is the way Jesus lived for us. This is both the humility and great purpose to which we are called. "Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return." Being like dirt is the call of Jesus, and it is ours. This is what we already are, and it is the purpose we are asked to live into.

Dust is fine dirt that has dried up and blown away. It is the most insignificant and does not ask to be more. We are called to be this given up to Jesus, to spend our lives in a way that leaves nothing left.