Rev. Kent Gilbert, Pastor Dr. Bernardo Scarambone, Director of Music
We Gather
Call to Confession
Ash Wednesday is a special day because it marks the start of something new. We are standing at the door of a journey into deeper faith, and God is inviting us in. However, we know that we cannot grow deeper and be transformed without God’s help. So as we begin this season, we confess together, asking for God’s participation in this new beginning. We are asking God to hold open the door. Let us pray:
Prayer of Confession
One: Holy God— We know that you are near, for you are always here, gathered among us, just a breath away. And despite knowing your nearness, we still stumble over ourselves, unsure of how to pray.
All: Bring our hearts into the room.
One: So often we talk to you like a stranger, praying prayers of small talk about the weather and surface level concerns. We keep genuine fear and doubt tucked into corners, out of sight, out of mind.
All: Bring our hearts into the room.
One: And so often we try to think our way to you, as if we could use logic or our minds alone to explain your great unknown. We forget what we knew as children; we forget how to feel our way to you.
All: Bring our hearts into the room.
One: And too regularly, we limit our experience of you to one hour a Sunday, missing your constant invitation into the holiness all around us. Forgive us. Guide us.
All: Bring our hearts into the room.
One: We are here, God. We want to begin again.
All: Bring our hearts into the room. Amen.
Words of Assurance
One: Friends, whether you are standing at the door of a deeper faith journey, unsure of what comes next, or running your way through that threshold, You are claimed, forgiven, and loved by God.
All: Again and again, we are forgiven. Again and again, we are loved. Again and again, we are invited in.
One: Thanks be to God for a love like that.
All: Amen.
Singing Together Give Me a Clean Heart Douroux
Reprinted with permission using OneLicense #A-723786
Scripture Reading Isaiah 58:1-12
Shout out, do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet! Announce to my people their rebellion, to the house of Jacob their sins. Yet day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God; they ask of me righteous judgments, they delight to draw near to God. “Why do we fast, but you do not see? Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day, and oppress all your workers. Look, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to strike with a wicked fist. Such fasting as you do today will not make your voice heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin? Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindicator shall go before you, the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
Reflection Rev. Kent Gilbert
Singing Together Give Me a Clean Heart Douroux
Receiving Ashes
Prayer of Invitation
One: Creator God,
There is a rumbling in us that won’t let go.
It stirs in us like the wind stirs leaves—inviting us to move, drawing us forth.
When we’re quiet, we know that rumble is the Holy Spirit,
Dancing love awake in us.
So we’re here.
And we’re still.
And we’re quiet.
And on this first day of Lent, we’re asking you to draw near.
Open the door for us to move.
Invite us in. Rumble us awake.
Gratefully we pray, Amen.
Receiving Ashes
The ashes of last year’s Palm Sunday fronds were burnt and prepared for use on Ash Wednesday. The ashes, symbolizing sin and distance from God and our best selves, are mixed with oil, a sign of God’s blessing, forgiveness and anointing for special purpose. We begin our Lenten journey in humility and in hope by placing the ashes and oil on our heads or hands. You do not have to be a member of this church, or any church, to mark this sacred time and journey.
Musical Meditation
Singing Together Give Me a Clean Heart Douroux
We Go Forth
Affirmation of Faith
We believe in an inviting God Who invites the poor and the sick, The outcast and the lonely, The immigrant and the refugee, The awkward and the abrasive, The young and the innocent. We believe God invites the best and the worst— In all of us.We believe God invites us to: A life of faith, A crowded table, A messy church, A deeper truth, A resilient joy, A place to belong, A family among strangers, A world that is just, And a love that knows no bounds. We believe this invitation exists for all people. We believe this invitation exists for us. And when we miss the call or ignore the invite, We believe that God invites us again. Thanks be to God for that invitational Spirit. Amen.
Singing Together Give Me a Clean Heart Douroux
Benediction
Postlude
Blessing the Dust for Ash Wednesday
All those days
you felt like dust,
like dirt,
as if all you had to do
was turn your face
toward the wind
and be scattered
to the four corners
or swept away
by the smallest breath
as insubstantial—
did you not know
what the Holy One
can do with dust?
This is the day
we freely say
we are scorched.
This is the hour
we are marked
by what has made it
through the burning.
This is the moment
we ask for the blessing
that lives within
the ancient ashes,
that makes its home
inside the soil of
this sacred earth.
So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are
but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.
—Jan Richardson from Circle of Grace: A Book of Blessings for the Seasons
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