March 16, 2024
As I mentioned in my column in this week’s Bellwether, yesterday was the sixth anniversary of my arrival in Chardon. Not every anniversary has been so mundane however. On the first anniversary, the country shut down because of the pandemic, and we had to learn how to be “church” in a completely different way. Me too—I had to learn how to be a pastor in a completely different way, and literally overnight I had to learn how to conduct worship on video instead of in person.
Those two things—a different way of being the church and a different way of being a pastor—often intersected. For example, in my weekly videos, we didn’t observe the Lord’s Supper once a month, we observed it every week. And I remember, for Ash Wednesday 2021—a few weeks before we finally resumed in-person worship on Easter Sunday—we actually prepared little tiny bags of ashes so that everybody could mark themselves as they participated in worship through watching the video I’d prepared.
The Ash Wednesday experience is fresh on my mind, because we so recently experienced it once again earlier this month. Since 2022, of course, we’ve been doing it live; and whether it was online or in person, it’s always a moving experience. Ash Wednesday is the day that we receive the sign of the cross made with the ashes of last Palm Sunday’s palms, and hear the words, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
This reminder serves two purposes, I think. The first is to remind us that we are mortal. What we are now, what we’re experiencing now, won’t go on forever. It will probably end sooner than we want it to. Ultimately, we are not in control.
If that sounds negative (and I guess it does—horribly negative) the second purpose—to me, at least—is more positive. The ashes, and the words, “Remember that you are dust,” remind us that we are part of something almost infinitely greater than ourselves. We are made of the same stuff as the earth. And if this is important to remember as we think about our mortality, then it’s even more important to remember when we think about our immortality. When we celebrate the Ascension of Jesus, I love talking about how we’re made of the same stuff as the stars.
Ernesto Cardenal, a Nicaraguan priest, wrote a lengthy poem called Cosmic Canticle. And in it he asked, What's in a star but we ourselves? All the elements of our bodies and of the planet were in the entrails of each star. We are stardust, he said. So much extraterrestrial material has fallen to earth that perhaps even the ground we tread is extraterrestrial.
It’s a beautiful way to think about the world and the people in it—to know that there’s more to each other than what meets the eye. We’re each a unique arrangement of atoms—building blocks so minute that our minds cannot comprehend how small they are. But these unimaginably small atoms are themselves made up of smaller particles—protons and neutrons and electrons—all separated by fields, fundamental forces that are filled with power.
I suppose it’s too much for a sermon. But think about what the Apostle Paul said in this morning’s scripture reading [Philip. 3:20]: We are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. How can we not be citizens of heaven, when our bodies are made up of the elements of the cosmos?
There are different ways of thinking about God and heaven, and the traditional way is to think of God as wholly other, as being completely outside of creation. This places heaven completely outside the universe as well. And so if we think of God and heaven in this way, Paul’s statement means that we will never be at home in creation, for we belong elsewhere. And maybe this is true. After all, Solomon prayed at the dedication of the first temple, “But will God really live on earth among people? Why, even the highest heavens cannot contain you. How much less this Temple I have built!”
But this theology has competition. What does it mean when Paul says, “Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you”? To many modern theologians, this fits perfectly with the notion that God fills all of God’s creation, that God is somehow part of all that God has made. This doesn’t mean that creation is God, for God is infinitely more than the universe. But still, God infuses creation and participates in it. To look at God this way makes God less of an almighty Ruler, forcing God’s will on creation, and more of a loving and ever-present parent, taking part in all that is—every breath and movement, every thought and decision.
And so what does Paul mean when he says that we are citizens of heaven? Do we belong elsewhere, or is heaven literally a part of us? I suppose it’s possible that both could be true, but either way you look at it, the message of Philippians 3 is important. Paul writes with tears in his eyes of those who live only for themselves, whose only desire is immediate gratification. They act on physical impulse without thinking of the future, without thinking of other people, and without caring for creation.
If we go back to what happened on Ash Wednesday, it’s easy to see how a reminder that we were made from the materials of the earth can also be a wake-up call to stop living selfishly. We are part of everything else, and God calls us to something more than ourselves… for we are citizens of a commonwealth greater than we can even see.
I like that word commonwealth. It’s the way the old Revised Standard Version of the Bible translated Philippians 3:20: Our commonwealth is in heaven. Commonwealth: a community founded for the common good of all who live there. Thus, the true homeland of all who trust in God is the commonwealth of heaven. And I think we’re free to interpret that as a place beyond creation, or we can think of it as the realm of God which exists within everyone.
Either way, to live as citizens of heaven is the exact opposite of living selfishly. Living as citizens of heaven—regardless of what form heaven takes in our belief system—means living for God and living for others; it is living in full awareness that this is not all there is. Right in front of our eyes, though we cannot see it, there is infinitely more to this physical world than we’re aware of. But there is also a spiritual realm that we ignore to our own detriment.
There are many people these days who love to say they’re “spiritual, not religious.” This is wonder-ful. We should all prefer the deep expressions of faith to the stuff that only lies on the surface, the stuff we memorize or turn to thoughtlessly—at least when we’re alone with our Creator.
But religious isn’t bad, either. Religious is what allows us to worship together. It’s what’s scheduled, what we share. But even more importantly, it’s what we turn to when spirituality isn’t working for us. And let’s admit it: We’re not always as spiritual as we know we ought to be. And so living religiously—even if it’s just going through the motions—helps us feel connected so that we’re not left to our own devices during the dry seasons of our lives.
But I think most importantly, this horrible thing called “organized religion” is how we reach out beyond these four walls. Today’s special offering is one of the best examples we have. Over 75 years ago, somebody decided that the churches needed to do more to help people recovering from World War 2. Maybe the person or people who came up with this idea were feeling particularly spiritual, not religious… or maybe they were being more religious than spiritual—who knows? But they arranged for an offering to be received in a whole bunch of churches on Easter Sunday 1949—something that can’t happen without organized religion.
And it’s been going on ever since. It’s called One Great Hour of Sharing in the United Church of Christ and many other denominations. And it’s called Week of Compassion in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). It’s received during Lent, and it’s a way to show that we live for God and others, even during those times when we’re just going through the motions. When disaster strikes during the year, we are there helping dependably, because our religion organized an offering in March.
The Holy Spirit dwells within us, so God knows our weaknesses. We’re supposed to stop living for ourselves, and to know at all times that we are part of God and God is part of us. We’re supposed to always think of others, and to think of what’s best for the planet God has given us to care for. But when we don’t—when we fall short of who we should be—let us remember that we’re still temples of God’s Spirit. When left alone, it’s sometimes overwhelming, but remember, we’re not alone. We are citizens of heaven, citizens of the cosmos, empowered to work together to be something more, because God is with us.
—©2025 Sam Greening
