Christian Living

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I’ll have to say, what I spend most of my time doing each day is cleaning up my house. I don’t like to do it, can’t stand doing laundry, and even despise cleaning the bathrooms. For those of you who have male children in your home, you know that “going potty” is a hit or miss event and there are more misses than hits. Because of this, I’ve become addicted to Clorox disinfecting wipes, Tilex, Pine-Sol, Shout, and hand sanitizer. I’m telling you now, that if using…….excusing me, missing the “john” was an Olympic sport, my boys would receive the Gold! In any event, touching up the household is a major part of my daily routine.

Besides the bathroom and kitchen, sweeping and vacuuming are my next least favorite things to do. It’s just so tedious and always needed. The other day, while going down my checklist of things to complete, by the way it hardly ever gets completed, it was time for vacuuming. As I powered up the machine, I noticed how my bagless vacuum needed to be cleaned. While taking the container out of the machine (it never ceases to amaze me how he does this) our Father spoke to me and said “Now child, you know that you must clean the vacuum as well, you mustn’t mistake this cleaning tool, it can not cleanse itself. It’s much like your spirituality.” That’s when I actually looked at the vacuum and really analyzed its parts. Not only did I have to empty the container holding the dust and dirt, but I had to check the rollers and wash off the filters.

All this time, I had abused this machine, had taken it for granted thinking it will pick up anything I put in its way, and never needed any maintenance. This is somewhat what we do with our spirituality. We think that if we occasionally read the Bible, periodically listen to our Christian music, and pray each time we eat a meal is enough and completely protects our spirituality. Oh no dear sisters, this is false, and trust me I have learned it the hard way.

Matthew 22:37-38 “……Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.”

Heart, soul and mind….I compared these three to the parts of the vacuum. Our heart is like the bag or container of the machine where it holds all the junk. The rollers are very much like our minds and the filters act as our souls. Each one needs the other. I looked up the word vacuum in the dictionary and this is what it said “a state of emptiness; a void”. Isn’t it funny how we use a vacuum cleaner to collect dirt? So let’s ask ourselves, do we want our spirituality to reflect the dirt of the world or the word of God?

Deuteronomy 11:18 “Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.”

1 Peter 2:2 “Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you will grow up in your salvation.”

Wow! I get such a charge when the word of God fills my spirit. We must cleanse our minds, hearts, and souls of the wickedness of the world so that we can protect our spirituality and maintain our intimacy with Him. It’s much easier said than done.
I’m currently studying a workbook called “Seeking Him” by Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Tim Grissom. This workbook is excellent and seems to hit right on the head each week with issues that I am facing. In lesson four, day three, it speaks about repentance and how sin begins in our minds just as repentance does. This goes for just about anything, it starts in your mind. Just as the vacuum starts with it’s rollers moving across the floor to pick up the objects. Next, whatever your mind thinks of touches your soul, your being. Your soul allows only distinct values to enter into your heart. Your heart is where all your beliefs, emotions, and thoughts are held for later use in which then determines our actions and attitudes towards someone or something. The vacuum works in a similar fashion where it’s filters guard against objects that may be too big or too strong to pass through into the container or bag. Again, the container or bag houses what the rollers have picked up.

So what does this all mean? I guess what the Lord was trying to tell me was that I needed a spiritual clean up. It’s not everyday that I get to clean the bathroom, do the laundry, sweep up, and maintain the house as I see fit. I sometimes slack off. I sometimes let the dishes pile up for a few hours or don’t dust the furniture for a few weeks. Unless you are Mrs. Clean, I’m sure you are slow-moving with housework at times, as well. Just as we slack off with housework, we slack off with our spirituality. How do we go about cleansing it? I believe that one of the most important things we could do is finding out our life’s purpose. Not too long ago, I read Rick Warren’s “The Purpose Driven Life”. I learned about worship, fellowship, discipleship, ministry, and the mission. Once we incorporate these five factors we can begin to cleanse our spirits.

Psalm 86:4 “Bring joy to your servant for to you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.”

In closing, I want to thank God for giving me these thoughts and being able to express them to you. I want to thank Him for His words of encouragement, love, grace, and mercy. I extend, to each of you, the baton to teach our children, friends, and family about “vacuuming”. Sometimes it takes being uncomfortable, stepping outside of the box, doing the things that people least expect to show how much the Lord’s love has made a difference in our lives.

Psalm 51:10 “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.”

Liz

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