Just as I am; I come, I come.

Remember you are dust; I come, I come.

By Allan Roy Andrews

Lent began this week with one of those denominational surprises. 

Episcopalians don’t bask in their memories of walking the altar-call path to repentance and forgiveness to the strains of “Just as I am, without one plea,” the 19^th-century evangelistic hymn that has become an unofficial anthem of the Billy Graham Crusades (Text by Charlotte Elliott, 1789-1871, and music by  William B. Bradbury, 1816-1868) . 

Nevertheless, we sang all six stanzas of the hymn as the hundred or so Ash Wednesday evening parishioners sauntered down the aisle to the altar rail and knelt to have a cross of burnt palm branch residue streaked across our foreheads and be reminded: “Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Back in the pew as the music and the imposition of ashes continued, I read carefully the words of the hymn.  “I come, I come.”  The credo of “I believe,” is overwhelmed by the venio of movement—“I come”--toward the altar.  The verb come is  repeated 13 times in the singing of the six stanzas in The Hymnal of the Episcopal Church; the 13^th sneaks in describing the bidding of the savior.

But the gracious wonder resides in how I come:  Just as I am.  No garments of morality; no sacrifice of doves or chocolate denial; no sackcloth; no swollen or scarred knees; no promises or pleas on my tongue; no because clauses; no self-assertions. 

Just as I am:  unemployed, underemployed, bought out by bonuses, crushed by balloon payments; fighting off the creditors; avoiding the turn to Chapter Nine; rescuing the resume; remembering unreturned favors; thinking seriously about ebay; mining for a family nest-egg.

Just as I am:  Joining others who recognize their dust-ness.  I come.  I come.