Ash Wednesday. The beginning of Lent. I slept well last night and have awoken, ready to begin my Lenten discipline. First, I look at the Lectionary. I’ve read the lessons for Ash Wednesday a few times already, so I’m off to a good start. I check my email. The daily email from Richard Rohr is in, but nothing else. I check my blog reader and several of the updates aren’t there yet. I glance at my blog and find it is running very slowly. I take a moment to address that. My morning time is slipping away, with no meaningful meditation and I remember that I am but dust.

We always hear about dust and ashes on Ash Wednesday. We are reminded of our mortality and ultimate insignificance. Yet at the same time, I hear Joni Mitchell singing Woodstock providing a line that will appeal to Neil deGrasse Tyson, “We are stardust”.

“And we've got to get ourselves. Back to the garden.”

I’ve been listening to The Rule of St. Benedict during my commute, and it just isn’t resonating. I’m hearing all the fear and unworthiness, but none of the Good news, the love of God. Fear based penitence just doesn’t sound right to my post modern ear. It doesn’t seem to fit with where I am in my journey.

What draws me closer to God, what makes me sit back, reflect, repent, seek to do better is not the fear of the Lord, in terms of being afraid of something powerful that will do me harm if I don’t do the right thing, it is more like awe of the Lord, that maker of the stars whose dust I am made of, the source of all Love which brings this earthly life meaning.

It is the desire to be closer to this love, to become a better vessel of this love, that drives me to penitence, to a recognition of my imperfections and my efforts to do God’s will.

One of the readings for today is Isaiah 58

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.

This is the fast to choose, sharing bread with the hungry. It is so different from the messages we see on television. It is so sorely needed in the current political climate.

Yet there is another part of this lesson that jumps out at me. My journey is driven by my response to God’s call, “Here I am”. This Lent is about learning more about what this response means. Yet in Isaiah, we find the Lord responding to our desire to feed the hungry saying “Here I am” to us.

Perhaps, this is part of getting us back to the garden that Joni Mitchell sings about, to a place where God seeks us, and instead of hiding out of fear, we say, “Here I am”. Instead of God being portrayed as vengeful, God is looking for us, saying to us, “Here I am”.

Perhaps, this is part of getting us back to the garden, where there is no more oppression nor injustice, because we have loosened the thongs and broken the yoke.

This was not how I expected to start my Lent, writing this blog post, but perhaps it sets the focus I need for these forty days, just as I am without one plea, undeserving of the Lord coming under my roof, not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under our Lord’s table, and yet, the Lord and I saying to one another, “Here I am”,