The cross reminds us that our innocent friend Jesus was abused and tortured and executed. The ashes are symbols of the earth, and a reminder that we are all creatures of the earth.Īshes remind us of our mortality, but why ashes in the sign of a cross? The cross in ashes reminds us of human sin and the resulting injustice that is part of life. Humility comes from humus, the Latin word for earth. The ashes speak of the virtue of humility, of knowing our human limits and knowing we need God. A church member, stopping by to chat, looked into the bowl and asked in horror, “Whose ashes are you keeping on your desk?” He answered, “All of ours!”Īshes on our forehead remind us that human life has limits, that it comes to an end, that we all die. As your forehead is marked with ashes, you will hear these words from Genesis 3:19-”Remember you are dust and to dust you will return.”Ī pastor tells of how every year after Ash Wednesday, he puts the brass bowl containing the leftover ashes on his office desk. We are to be reminded that we, like the palms that have been burned to make the ashes, will someday turn to dust.
It sets the believer on a sobering time of self-examination and repentance, to wait upon and prepare for the renewal given by God’s Spirit in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.Ī typical Ash Wednesday service includes the invitation for each person to come forward to have the sign of the cross marked on his or her forehead. Christian use of the ashes goes back to the 2nd century, and it was widely practiced by the 5th century.Īsh Wednesday begins the forty-day journey of Lent between Ash Wednesday and Easter. The practice of using ashes as a sign of penitence goes back to the Hebrew people (Jon 3:6 Mt 11:21). On Ash Wednesday, millions of Christians around the world engage in the ancient ritual known as “the imposition of ashes.” This service marks the beginning of Lent, the forty-day period, not counting Sundays, between Ash Wednesday and Easter.
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