Just Dust

Today, you may see someone walking around town with a smudge of ashes on their forhead. You may ask them why they appear as if they've been in a charcoal fight. And they may tell you that they'd been to church that day, where someone rubbed ashes on their heads while muttering the words, "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." The words of this ancient ritual come from Genesis 3:19, where God proclaimes curses to humans after they turn away from Him. In Genesis, and on Ash Wednesday, the words aim to remind us that sooner or later, we will die. Think of that. In a world that seems to endlessly move along, God wants you to remember that you will die. You.. will... die. Of course I'm not God, so I can't say exactly why. But apparently, there must be something about this reminder that we all desparately need. As many old men have told me, time goes too fast. And knowing that my time on earth is fleeting, that my days are over in a handbreath, may be just as important as having enough food to eat and air to breath. It's part of being human. So, failing to take seriously my own mortality is an act of denial which defies my humanness and ignores the rigid boundaries of my existance. Most importantly, failure to acknowledge death delludes me on the most tragic level, preventing me from seeing and savoring God's shocking response to that great, grim bucket that all of us shall one day kick (John 11:25).

Cue Romans 3. Paul describes God as one who seeks to be just, faithful in providing the promised consequenses of human sin and rebellion. But this God also wants to be a justifier of the guilty humans that He so loves. His heart longs to be both "just and the one who justifies" at the same time.

How can he possibly do this? How can a just judge condemn and aquit the guilty at the same time? Verse 25 spills the beans: "God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement through faith in His blood... to demonstrate his justice." Who does the pronound refer to here? None other than God Himself. Jesus is God wearing flesh, presented as as a sacrifice for the purpose of providing and recieving the just punishment of sin. Thus, in the same, self-sacrificial act, God condemns and justifyies the guilty who have faith in Jesus Christ.

So what does this have to do with dust? Psalm 103:8-13 laments human sinfulness but praises God's willingness to have mercy. Verse 14 tells us why: "for He knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust."

Get that? God remembers that we are dust. And he refuses to leave us that way: "But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD'S love is with those who fear him..." (v. 17). So we're dust because we're human and God is just. But since God is more than just (he's also a justifier of the guilty!), we're more than dust. We'll wear his love like a crown forever.

In other words, since God is a just justifier, we're far more than just dust.

Amen.