If we had saved our palm leaves from last Palm Sunday, we could follow an ancient Lenten tradition this evening. We could burn the palm leaves and then apply the palm ashes to our foreheads in the sign of a cross.

The ashen cross upon our forehead would be a sign and symbol of where we stand under the mighty hand of God’s judgment.

Lent itself is a time for facing up to God’s judgment. A time for recognizing God’s attitude towards our selfishness and gluttony and hypocrisy and every other black cloud of sin that hangs over our lifestyle. Lent is a time for seeing in the wrenched face and hearing in the doleful groans of our Lord Jesus, God’s spleen vented against every last weed of rebellion growing in his harmonious garden.

Lent is God’s way of stripping us bare of every lame excuse, e…