By Design

• CROP Walk for Hunger is next Sunday at 2pm in Shelburne. Walk with us. Help us fundraise.
• Harvest Supper (sit down and take away) on November 2nd at 5:30pm.

Watch the recoding HERE

I have a friend who often says: We are all simply stardust and to stardust we will become again.  Sometimes I ponder the idea that this is a reminder of heaven (whatever “heaven” is to you) and that we are already divine beings and loved beings.  

These words are not to minimize us. Maybe it is but not in a “bad” way, in a Good way.  It’s like ashes to ashes and dust to dust.  Those are the words we use at funerals.  Those are the words that surround the Ash Wednesday services.  

These are the words of death and life and faith.  They are the ultimate common denominator.  The things that brings us together and makes us the same.  We are all going to die.  We are all uniquely small.  We are all part of something bigger.  Stardust.  Dirt.  Ashes.  Dust.

It’s also the thing that makes us want to separate from one another.  We don’t want to think about death.  In a way, we almost want to believe that it won’t happen to us.  Those things happen to other people.  We know it doesn’t make sense.  We know that we are all going to die.  At the same time, we behave as if it happens to “other people” and not us.  

It’s also the beginning of connection and belonging.  If we have nothing else, we are all going to go through death.  We are all going to grieve and hurt.  At the same time, it is a journey of beauty and compassion.  

Perhaps, it is the beginning of the deepest of longing.  Longing for something more.  The Mystery.  Belief.  God.  Heaven.

For all that we try to separate and divide, the more we understand and work to open our own eyes to see, the more connected than ever we are. The more connected everything is.  There is no death without life.  There is no life without death.  

Startdust.  Ashes.  Dust.  Terrifying and beautiful.  

I know it’s not anywhere near Ash Wednesday.  I also didn’t intend to talk about death today. I came to talk about living and living well.  Maybe that just highlights the point that you can’t separate the two. You can’t really talk about living without talking about dying.  

Ash Wednesday brings us into Lent and Lent brings us to Good Friday.  Jesus says: pick up your cross and follow me.  Life is hard sometimes.  Doing the right thing is hard sometimes.  Being a good follower sometimes comes with unexpected and unintended (and unwanted) consequences.

Good Friday brings us to Easter and the resurrection and what’s…beyond.  What’s on the other side of the cross.  Life. The Living Water.  The Source. The Mystery.  Renewal.  Rebirth.  Life.  Heaven.

Was also have to remember it’s all perspective.  We have a wider lens (or maybe a different lens is a better phrase) than when those original words were said.  PAUSE.  We have an entirely different meaning to: pick up your cross and follow me.  PAUSE.  For the disciples, they knew what the cross meant death. It meant an incredibly painful and horrible death.  PAUSE.  Imagine that…we sometimes know this, but don’t really know it. We are very skilled at avoiding the idea of death.

There’s a lot more to the Cross and the Mystery and the Story, but let’s look for a moment at the simple reality of it.  The cross meant death and not an easy death.  Sometimes that happens too. Life isn’t a gift of ease. But it’s still beautiful and a blessing.

Ashes to ashes.  We are all going to die.  It’s our common denominator.  We are stardust and ash and dust.  And it is Good.  

Ashes, dust, stardust bookends this small and finite (and infinite) life we each have. It gives us a shared story.  It reminds us to look to the end, not because we’re morbid, but to highlight our lives.  Looking at the end makes us think and live, and hopefully live well.  

We might have different thoughts about what the end looks like and what that means for our day to day life.  PAUSE. The end is a constant remembering that, no matter what, it will all be okay, we will be loved (saved) by God in the end. The end informs our day to day. It is a reminder to live each day with love and forgiveness and Good Work.  We know to live a Good Life and in the end: I am Loved and I am Love.  

In the middle, in the now, we simply hold to faith, do good, and tend to one another.  We have a moral compass of Jesus.  Values that are unchanging and unchangeable: like goodness, love, forgiveness, mercy, kindness, etc. No matter what else happens in our lives.  No matter the losses, the hurts, the failures, the falls, we choose to be anchored in something that cannot die or be broken or taken away. PAUSE.  

We choose to be anchored in deep abiding values of peace, joy, hope, love, etc.  

This is our tether.  PAUSE.  

Things fade and fall and die away.  Money. Possessions.  Prestige.  Even people and relationships change.  But nothing can shake or break these unshakable values of faith in God/Grace/theUniverse.  This is why faith is so important.  Imagine our lives created around these unshakable things.  

There’s no ashes or dust or stardust that fades away in these core values of Grace.  Ashes and dust and stardust are also absolutely FILLED with this Grace. It abounds all around us. If only we look and choose to see.  

It’s often that we’re closing our eyes to the goodness all around us.  Look at the passage here.  Good is done, but not by “our people”.  PAUSE.  We do this too.  We choose not the see the good done by…the other side, the other people, the other group, the other church, the other faith, the other whatever. PAUSE.  We look down on people and up on others.  We make some people our own and other people…not.  We tend to behave as if bad things happen to other people…but not to us or ours (or if it does, it shouldn’t).

We’re all going to return to ashes, to dust, to stardust.  PAUSE.  We’re all in this together.  And regardless of the “other”…we all share these unshakable values underlying the stories.  For us they are the core of Jesus, of God…they are Universal.  And being universal they underscore all people and all faiths.  PAUSE. 

These values are woven into the very fabric of life.  They belong to all of us.  

What is it you want to do with this one wild and precious life?  It’s not a “happy” poem.  It’s a scream to live life and live it fully.  

We, each of us, is designing our lives.  PAUSE.  Whether by active design or by default.  Our faith can be our design.  Taking the universal weave of these bigger values, the Compass, and making it a part of our daily living. Values like Love, Forgiveness, Compassion, Hope, Tenderness, Mercy, Kindness, Courage. 

We have chosen a faith that charges us toward service toward one another.  Whatever we are doing, easy or hard, we choose to serve.  We can choose our work as a drudgery or as a greater act of service (whatever we are doing).  We may feel overwhelmed by our busy life, but we must make time for one another.  To guide and help and serve one another.  To be present for one another.

We are all in this together. Jesus knows this.  Perhaps by practicing a life of service and remembering the deep abiding never dying anchors of our faith, we might build up a world that seems intent on being torn down.  We might serve one another, the more than human world, the earth in a world that is intent on spending the world.  

We might choose to live a life of Compassion and Connection and we just might share those treasures with the world.  We might look upon stars and dust and ash and be awed by this great creation of God that we are blessed to be given a part in.  And we just might choose to serve it and one another.