VBCC - "Ash Wednesday"

We began the season of Lent with an Ash Wednesday gathering. Below is how we explained what that's all about, and further, about our discussion time in the meeting on "turning and transformation."

+ Alan

+ Ash Wednesday - we begin the season of Lent +

What is all this? Why ashes? Why Lent? What’s the point? Good questions – we should always ask questions like this and never simply accept things as they are. Maybe that’s my rebellious nature. I must be related to Jesus or something.

A part of our vision here at Vine & Branches is to re-incorporate healthy ancient rhythms of Christian community life into the contemporary context in which we live – to make them a vital part of our life as Christians together. The sanctification of the calendar is one of those things – the breaking up of the physical year into celebrations of our spiritual life so that we are constantly reminded of who we are, who God is, and how much He loves us and in how many ways. Yes, it can become more a religious exercise than a celebration if we let it – let’s not let it! The point is that we weave these things into the spirit-filled life of our community and they become a part of that life. They aren’t the total focus of the life, merely a helpful part of it.

Ash Wednesday and Lent are a part of that rhythm. The crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus are the center points of our faith. Without these things we have no faith, no hope. We begin tonight a looking forward – a concentrated looking – to the celebration of these great events. This day in particular, we look at ourselves. It is a day of self-examination. I want to say this clearly: its not about morbid, guilty introspection and self-condemnation. This is unhealthy and produces nothing worthwhile. It is, though, about honestly assessing ourselves and ourself – both individually and commonly as a community. We look and see where we are and allow God to show us where we need to be - where only He can take us. We take ashes on our heads in the sign of the cross to remember our weakness without Him and that it is only through and in Christ that we are raised from our own merely human “ashes.”

This is also a day of rejoicing as well as sober examination and turning. Its a day of turning-to and not just turning-from. We turn to God in His infinite mercy and love – we cry out to Him – and we fully realize that He is here in us and among us, forgiving us, healing us, restoring us, and continually building us into the people He created us to be.

Thank You Lord Jesus! Come and Heal Us!

After we got our heads dirty, we went on to talk about what this is all about in our lives - turning and transformation - a discussion surrounding one verse of scripture: 2 Corinthians 3:18...

“All of us, gazing with unveiled face on the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as from the Lord who is the Spirit.” –NAB

“And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” –NRSV

Among the topics which sprang out of this verse were the following:

• the fact that we are BEING TRANSFORMED and aren't fully yet - that its a process.

• that "transformed" conotes "inside out" and is God's doing as opposed to "conformed" which is outside in and more our doing.

• that our part in this process is the "gazing" or "looking" at God - basically openning ourselves to Him in order for Him to do the work in us.

• that in the context of the verse, "unveiled faces" is in reference to our state as those under the new covenant of Jesus, having been given full access to God through Him - we no longer need to look and see Him through a veil, and secondarily we at times "veil" ourselves from Him.

• that WE corporately are the temple of the Holy Spirit and not just ME as an individual - that it says by no accident "all of us" are gazing - we are transformed in the context of community and if we aren't living that life we are crippled in a way - if we don't look or gaze at the faces of our siblings, we will not be fully seeing the face of Jesus.