Release Date: February 18th, 2026Mark Me with Ashes
- by Sara Erb
I love Lent—always have, and hopefully always will. There’s something beautiful about the Church Calendar’s Lent Season, where it is not only okay to not always be okay, it is actually encouraged. Ash Wednesday provides the reminder of my mortality, my limitations. The invitation to let myself sink into the reality that I simply can’t do it all—and for good reason. I was not made to do it all. I was made finite.
Lent provides six weeks to dwell in my imperfections.
The confessions that come with Lenten practices are also an assurance that in my finiteness, my ability to do it all right is even less likely. I will, without a doubt (and hopefully not too much shame), make mistakes. I will drop the ball. I will say the wrong thing at the wrong time in the wrong place. I will at times choose my selfish desires over others. I will… I will… I will…
And yet, again, our Christian tradition has specifically created space—each and every year, without fail—to offer an intentional reminder that I am not perfect, and that I simply cannot be perfect. Lent provides six weeks to dwell in my imperfections—not as punishment or isolation, but as opportunity. Opportunity to surrender the pressure to do it all and be perfect all the time. Opportunity to dwell in the fact that I am human. I am not God, nor will I ever be. Opportunity to do so with other perfectly finite humans right beside me—naming our shortcomings, naming our longings, and resting from the relentless call of perfectionism.
Mark me with ashes, please, as an invitation to crumble into the arms of God.
And so, this Lenten season, this Ash Wednesday, mark me with ashes, please. Mark me to set me free from the pressure of getting it all right the first time, or doing it all, or being everything to everyone. Mark me with ashes, please, as an invitation to crumble into the arms of God during a long, dark, hard time of year—joined by my fellow siblings in Christ.
Mark me with ashes, please, as we spend these next six weeks with intention, preparing for the work of God in the world—in our communities, our congregations, and even within ourselves—as we approach Holy Week and the freedom that is promised each and every Easter. A reminder that my belovedness, my salvation, my identity as a child of God is not undone by my mortality. Rather, it is an integral part of it all. God receives me just as I am during this time of Lent (and always), providing me rest, and preparing me for the hope that is still to come.
Mark me with ashes, please.
Remember, dear one, that you are mortal. From dust you came, and to dust you shall return. Yet God’s steadfast love endures forever.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
- Sara Erb is on the pastoral team at Steinmann Mennonite Church, Baden, ON.