The symbolism of ashes goes all the way back to Genesis chapter 3 where God is telling Adam the consequences of his sin. He tells him that the ground, the earth has been cursed and now since Adam broke the fast and ate the forbidden fruit his eating from now on –all the days of your life- will be in sorrow. He goes on: Through thorns and thistles and sweat and toil and pain will Adam eat and to make matters worse- in the end his eating will not result in life anyway. His painful eating will prolong his painful life but in the end he will return to the dust from which he came. “For dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return”

When you said I will fast and I will pray, and I will deal with my besetting sins over the next 40 days you picked a fight. And whatever this confrontation may mean we must not remove the demonic element from this discussion.

And we can be valiant because we have been armed with the ashes of penitence. Our foreheads have been sealed with the mark of Christ, we have been branded as his own and our victory is assured by His Resurrection. This call to battle was issued on Ash Wednesday at the conclusion of the imposition of ashes in the following collect:

Grant to us, O Lord, to put on the armor of our Christian warfare with holy fastings: that we, who are to fight against all spiritual wickedness; may be defended by the power of abstinence. Through Christ, our Lord.

The life of Jesus of Nazareth did not unfold before the eyes of God, it was all of it- always present before Him, His Birth, Passion and Glorious Resurrection the whole life fully present, His glory was present in his birth and in his death, there was no uncertainty about how things would end up.

Your life too- for all the doubt, uncertainty and vacillation, for all the weariness and wandering- your life, your whole life past present and future is all present before the face of God, God knows you in this way, even the you - you do not yet know is present before His face.

One of the most basic fundamental duties of a Christian soldier is to be attentive to their thoughts. This is where the battle will be won or lost. We are admonished to take every thought captive. It is astonishing to realize how many people do not understand the critical battle ground of our thoughts. If you do not do something about your thoughts, if you do not take this seriously and address this you will lose the fight.

Whether you know it or not everyone here today is a runner, a boxer, an entrepreneur, a vineyard worker, this is what you are, it is what God made you to be and you will never be happy until you start running, boxing, buying and investing, pruning and harvesting. Now the good news is this- if you run you will win, if you box you will overcome, if you buy you will get rich, if you prune you will reap a great harvest- it is guaranteed- you can have total confidence in the outcome if you only engage- be courageous, take up your sword and go into battle and you will be victorious. Sit on the couch- give up- quit- despair- and you will be lost.

Jesus does not provide the answer that so many are demanding of God on their own terms, shaking their silly little fists in the face of the one who died for them. But he does give an answer, he gives the only answer that will enable man to endure and make it safely through this stormy trip. It is up to us whether we will hear what Jesus tells us with faith and love, and trust because we know Him, we know he is trustworthy, he is true and good and just and we know that he loves us, really know it, that is faith, knowing you are loved and so we receive His word and it is enough.

If you are a Christian you have declared your allegiance to this kingdom. You are no longer a member of the world kingdom, even though you physically still exist in this world you are not of it, you are from above, your citizenship is in the kingdom of God and you are a member of the Family of God. And our society has different rules and a different way of life. We live here in God’s house.

Life is in the temple because Jesus is in and is the Temple and that temple as far as we are concerned is the liturgically gathering Apostolic Eucharistic Church. This is where we fulfill the very meaning of our existence, to offer ourselves to God in sacrificial worship as a community. We do this for one reason only because it is right, this is the only reasonable response of the creature to His creator.

The mother of Jesus said to Him, “They have no wine.” Jesus does not respond, there is only silence and yet there is so much for us to lean in that space of silence. Her confidence, her trust and faith ring out in the silence. In the empty pause when the Word did not speak - the Woman without much ado confidently gives a command that has echoed throughout the ages. With this command and her fiat spoken to the angel, the Woman has taught the world about the one thing most important- “Whatever He says to you, do it.”

The family becomes a true reflection of the divine society only in as much as they flourish in the Church, otherwise they can become a stumbling block to salvation. Jesus makes it clear in this story that his earthly mother has no rights over him which are at odds with His heavenly Father. The family is a sacramental union of divine life but only if it is subservient to the Church, to the Family of God in the Spirit.