Category Archives: Sin

Smudgy Stains

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Little Emerald is 11 months now, and though she can’t talk, she’s been communicating the same message since she began crawling a few weeks ago: “Clean your floors, Grandma Midgee.”

Taking advantage of her new mobility, she’s been investigating every corner of my cottage on hands and knees, a cleaning crew of one. But instead of swinging a broom or swiping a Swiffer, she just uses her clothes.

Dirty DudsThis morning while Birgitta was at school, Emerald and I worked on several projects in the basement. Although I sat her down next to a bin of toys, she quickly flipped to mobile-mode, resuming her floor-cleaning program. In just a few minutes her hands, knees and toes were black with who-knows-what, and at that point we abandoned the basement and headed upstairs to clean up.

Until Emerald began crawling, I had no idea my floors were as dirty as they were. It took “contaminating her” to let me know.

Isn’t that similar to what Jesus did for our filthy sins?

DarknessWhile on the cross, he willingly “crawled through” the sin-contamination of all mankind, letting every sin from every person, past, present and future, dirty him through and through. Scripture tells us he “became” our sin. How can we not sit up and take notice of how dirty he became, just so we wouldn’t have to be?

Then, after Jesus rose from the dead, everything changed. He conquered sin and therefore could become pure again himself, as he had been before he picked up all our filth. His suffering was “once for all,” after which he could freely offer an eternal clean slate to all of us.

So then why do we continue to suffer from guilt over our own sin? It’s because we’re shocked by  the blackness of it, just like I was surprised to see Emerald’s filthy clothes. But as we turn from our “dirty deeds” and ask forgiveness, recommitting ourselves to live for Christ, God no longer sees our dark smudges, all because of Jesus. Our sins have been deep-sixed into the sea, and we can enjoy release from the heavy darkness of guilt. What a beautiful cleansing system our Lord has!

  • I lay my sins on Jesus, the spotless Lamb of God;
  • He bears them all and frees us from every guilty load.
  • I bring my guilt to Jesus, to wash my crimson stains
  • White in His blood most precious, ‘til not a spot remains.

(Horatius Bonar)

I’ve made a concentrated effort to get the dirty stains out of Emerald’s pink clothes, but even my best scrub brush and a combination of chemicals have left telltale smudges related to the blackness that used to be.

How glorious that when Jesus goes about forgiving even the darkest of sins, he does it all the way to spotless.

“Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” (Isaiah 1:18)

 

I lay my sins on Jesus, the spotless Lamb of God;

He bears them all and frees us from every guilty load.

I bring my guilt to Jesus, to wash my crimson stains

White in His blood most precious, ‘til not a spot remains.

(Horatius Bonar)

Yuk!

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Pine-solI like to keep a neat house, but it’s not always clean-neat. Picking-up is easy compared to breaking out the Pine-sol, Windex, and Pledge. This last week, however, the kitchen took on a strange air that none of us could identify. It wasn’t exactly smelly, but something wasn’t quite right.

As the days passed, every so often we’d get a whiff of wierd, and finally, after a week, whatever it was began to reek. Birgitta, Louisa, and I opened every drawer and cabinet, leaning in for repeated sniffs, desperate to find the problem. Was it rotting food in the waste can? In the disposal? Under the stove? In the drain pipe?

None of those.

Although we kept hunting, we also lit scented candles and sprayed room deodorizer. Whatever it was, it continued to worsen until we were gagging and unable to eat anywhere near the kitchen. What in the world was it?

Today we found out.

Reaching into the cabinet beneath the kitchen sink, I twisted to the right to get a pair of rubber gloves hanging over the drain pipe when I saw it. Snuggled up next to the back of the Kitchen Aid mixer was a dead field mouse. At least I thought it was dead. He hadn’t moved as I’d rummaged around at close range, and the smell in the back of the cabinet was absolutely putrid.

So I did what any woman would do. I insta-backed out of the cabinet and slammed the door.

Later when I showed Louisa what I’d found, we marveled at how tiny the little mouse was and how big its stench. It reminded me of a tiny word that always brings big stink into our lives: sin.

Because the devil is very clever, he coaxes us toward evil in mini-bits. “A little won’t matter,” he says. “Besides, no one needs to know.” And for a time, that may be true. But as Scripture says, what we do on the Q.T. will eventually be spotlighted…. when its smell has grown so big it dominates us and disgusts those around us. Our best bet is to clean it out in its early stages, well before it begins to rot us.

Nite niteAs for our mouse, since I was the one who’d put De-con poison in the back of the cabinet, I was elected to take him out. Though he seemed dead and his odor confirmed it, I wondered if he would run up my sleeve when I tried to grab him. In the end, I double-bagged my hand, let out a long, loud yell, and picked him up. Sure enough, he was dead.

Not long after that, the comforting scent of Pine-sol filled the room, and our women-against-beast adventure was over. If only it was that easy to rid ourselves of sin.

“Dead flies [or mice] make the perfumer’s ointment give off a stench; so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor.” (Ecclesiastes 10:1)

The Correct Analysis

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Nate wasn’t a natural handyman. He didn’t have a work bench in the basement and was mystified by power tools. But as needs arose, he was game to try.

A new toolI remember the day he returned from Home Depot toting a brand new chain saw. Admittedly it was on the small side, but he was determined to participate in cutting up firewood after Bervin and his boys, along with our boys, had cut down a tree. Once Nate got the hang of it, he didn’t stop until all the wood had been transformed into a neat stack of firewood.

That evening as we were getting ready for bed, he began complaining about pressure in his chest and pain down his arm. Thinking “heart attack,” we headed straight for the ER.

After making a thorough analysis of test data, the doctor on duty stood in front of us with his clipboard and said, “We just can’t figure it out. Your heart seems healthy. What’d you do today? Anything unusual?”

Both of us had failed to mention Nate’s afternoon partnership with a chain saw, and when we did, the mystery was solved. He’d worked so hard and long, his chest and arm muscles were having spasms, which then caused pain, which masqueraded as a heart attack. With lots of muscle relaxant and a few pain pills, we headed home, relieved at the simple diagnosis.

How often do we mentally leap to the worst-case-scenario? Sometimes we even do that in our spiritual lives. For example, we make a wrong choice, become overwhelmed with our own sin, and jump to the conclusion of, “Surely God doesn’t love me anymore, after what I’ve done.”

Or we make progress winning over a bad habit only to slip and have to start all over again. “I’m such a poor example of a Christian,” we tell ourselves. “God must be really disappointed in me.”

Or we try to tell someone about our faith and bungle it badly, leaving out important information and landing on the insignificant. Later we beat ourselves up and say, “Surely God sees me as more of a liability than an asset when it comes to sharing his Gospel.”

GraceBut all of those analyses are just as bogus as Nate’s and my diagnosis of a heart attack. These statements of self- condemnation are based on believing lies from the devil rather than truth from the Lord. Scripture tells us our God is a God of grace, and because of that, sin and failure can no longer judge us. (Romans 6:14)

An accurate acronym for the word “grace” is, God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense, and because he paid a very dear price, we are allowed to be on the receiving end of those incredible riches.

So, if we’re ever tempted to leap to heart-attack-style conclusions about our spiritual inadequacies, here’s one more acronym: Give Ridiculous Assumptions Clear-cut Endings.

“Where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” (Romans 5:20)