Ashes to ashes, dust to dust

Remember that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return.  ~Genesis 3:19

Turn away from sin and be faithful to the Gospel.  ~Mark 1:15

These verses are traditionally used on Ash Wednesday with the dispensing of the ashes.  As the countdown to the cross begins we are encouraged to remember the shortness of life and to repent while there is time.  This year I've been given a very poignant reminder of the reality of these verses.

Leroy Reuben Amunrud

February 9, 1929 - March 9, 2011

Today my Granddad died after a short bout with pneumonia.  I am not sure of his spiritual state, but I think he was saved, and I like to believe that he is now with God, discovering all the secrets of the universe.  Physics and Ranching were his two passions in life.  If you sat down to talk to him for more than a minute or two, you could be fairly sure that one or the other (or both) would come up in the conversation.  He grew up in Eastern Montana and spent much of his adult life working to be able to go back to the ranch.  He worked on some of the first computers and taught math at the college level, but always wanted to go back to ranching.  He had a stroke this August and moved to Bozeman to recover, but he was always talking about gaining his strength so he could go back to the ranch in the spring.  Even as he lay on the hospital bed yesterday, sedated and unable to respond, he seemed to improve a little when we talked about the ranch, the spring, the bulls he would buy.  

He was not young and his health had been declining a bit, but it was still rather sudden.  Especially on this day, it reminds me: someday we will all return to dust and ashes, and there is no predicting that day.  Today, while we still have breath, let us use it to confess our sins and return to our savior.

You will be missed, Granddad.