This article is about what Jesus really would do in everyday situations. Laundry is a common, everyday chore. It is also in everyday chores that we can be Jesus to someone else through our thoughtfulness and courtesy to our fellow man.
My wife doesn’t do laundry. I do the laundry at our house. However, she doesn’t like telling her friends this anymore because they generally get too envious.
At camp meeting I needed to do the laundry one morning. I was fortunate and found two washers open. This is unheard of in the camp meeting laundry room on the 2nd floor of the boy’s dorm! With three loads to do this was my best start ever. Normally you have to wait almost as long it seems as that guy at the Pool of Bethesda.
A man came in the laundry room with a child’s blanket. Having young children, I immediately presumed that his child had wet the bed. He stated that he did not know how this “laundry mat thing works.” I felt a bond here with another man, a daddy, doing the washing for his child. There were no washers open and I told him one washer should be done in a few minutes. He said thanks, left his blanket and detergent on the out of order washer, and he left. I took someone’s load out of a dryer and put a wet load in.
When I returned there was a lady with three baskets of laundry waiting as another lady was very quietly taking her laundry out of the washer and putting it in the dryer. The waiting lady started coming over to the washer and I began to explain to her about the man and his blanket that was waiting to be washed. She abruptly cut me off and would have knocked me down had I got in her way. Arrogantly she blurts out, “I’m not doing anyone elses laundry, If you snooze, you lose” and dumped in her load. I was shocked and speechless! This is camp meeting lady! I thought to myself. As I was leaving, my thoughts were stuck on this woman’s rude and discourteous attitude.
The text flashed into my head, “’Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.’ Jesus would do your laundry, lady?”!
Feeling sympathy for the dad, I made up my mind when I returned to take my clothes out of the washer that I would personally put his child’s blanket in when my load was done.
When I went back into the building some 30 minutes later to check my load, I passed the man in the hallway on his way out and we exchanged short cordial greetings. In the laundry room, his blanket was gone and I can only assume that he put it back in his room to try again later, still soiled and smelly like only a child can make it. I took my clothes out of the washer and put them in the dryer feeling a little dejected because my plan to help someone did not come into fruition. No one was in the laundry room except me ....and two baskets of the ladies dirty clothes still sitting in a basket on the table staring at me. Hmmmm, I guess I’m the one who needs the mind of Christ. I took her basket, dumped it in the washer, poured in the detergent, set the dial setting, turned it on and left.
Not WWJD, but WJDML – Would Jesus Do My Laundry?
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