Lord,
You draw us here and confront us and comfort us with your Word. You draw us here and confront us with our sin and comfort us with your grace.
You draw us here and confront us and comfort us with the cross.
In Christ, exalted on the cross, we see the price paid for our own sin.
Our own towering pride, nailed to the tree.
The arrogant elevation of our own self-sufficiency, nailed to the tree.
Our belief in and pursuit of our own kingdoms, our own way, nailed to the tree.
King Jesus,
You have taken all of our struggles, all of our idolatry, all of our unbelief, all of our scheming self-justification, all of our sin as your own. By your mercy we are crucified with you, so that in you we might have your resurrection life.
By the light of your Word we see the dark mark of our sin. Yet by the light of your Word we are also marked with forgiveness and new life in your blood.
Repent us Lord, with the assurance that your Kingdom is at hand.
Have us see that this is the one day of the year we get to see the cross of our baptism traced on our foreheads. Have us know that the ashes that mark our foreheads are not for show. They are a preached proclamation. A terrifying reminder of the truth of our mortality, ashes to ashes and dust to dust. Yet they are also a Spirit breathed confession of hope, because God breathes life into dust.
So we are marked as children of the darkness, rescued to become children of the Lord of Light.
In the gracious and mighty name of Jesus Christ,
AMEN.