TOMORROW AND TOMORROW CREEPS IN THIS PACE FROM DAY TO DAY

William Shakespeare wrote in the tragedy of MacBeth in Act V: "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time. And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death. Out, out brief candle. Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

Dismal words, yet true. Life is brief, and nobody gets out of it alive. The finality and absurdity of life ending in death is unveiled, yet the image of a runner in a race, or perhaps the story of two hunters set
upon by a bear that stood and roared as one hunter pulled off his boots, grabbed and quickly laced them up as his friend asked, "What’s wrong? You can’t outrun the bear."

"Don’t have to," the hunter said. "just have to outrun you.”

The lesson is that one cannot outrun death. It is the predator. Death is one’s appointed end and will catch up with you eventually, maybe sooner than you want .

Each of us comes into life running from the bear. For awhile, in our youth, we are able to pick up speed and seemingly gain advantage, but as adolescence and older age set in, the faster the distance shrinks. And then comes the awareness that life is but a vapor. It
appears for a little time and then vanishes away –- and we realize that God uses aging and death to remind us that our lives truly are absurd and irrelevant. And it is at this point that we see that the
Christian tradition of the creation of man and woman in a world fitted for their service to God was all very good.

Estrangement of people and the absurdity of it are the result of sin and the fall. And yet even in the sentence of death, God provided a promise of life -- Genesis 3:15. Even in the expulsion from the garden and alienation from the Creator, God the redeemer was working a plan to restore his people to union and communion.

After Christmas, we need Lent. We cannot remain on the mountain top rejoicing in the incarnation. We must come down and reflect on the significance of Christ’s call to us. We must hear his call for conversion –- for repentance and faith.

We think of our human sin, our need. and our mortality.

We are called to see that death is the pathway to life. "Don’t you know that all of us who were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life."

For the follower of Christ, the way to dusty death still takes us through the valley of the shadow of death. But even then, the promise remains sure, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies."

It is even better that we rely upon the mercy of the one who alone is able to say, "Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last. I am the living one; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever. And I
hold the keys of death and hell."

We are reminded of the mercy and forgiveness proclaimed in the gospel of Jesus Christ and the need we all have always to renew our baptismal faith.

Let us simply and inwardly renew our fellowship with the Lord and give thanks over the ashes.