This evening at an Ash Wednesday service at the First Presbyterian Church in Champaign, IL, I received ashes on my forehead from my friend Pastor Chuck Carlson.
After receiving ashes I returned to my pew and sat quietly for 15 minutes, thinking about how ashes remind us of our own mortality and are a symbol of mourning and sorrow.
As I sat quietly, listening to mournful, beautiful music, a series of questions rolled across the screen high in the auditorium, including these two that I have been pondering all evening…
“Do you have pure and sincere motives?”
“Are you who and what you appear to be?”
