Cleaning Dayfeatured

Does anyone else get frustrated by how quickly things that have been freshly cleaned get dirty again?  It seems like my patio area is especially guilty.  I can work up quite a sweat getting the weeds out of the surrounding flower beds, sweeping all the leaves and dirt away, and washing all the dust off the patio furniture.  Then life happens.  The wind invites new leaves to replace the banished ones and determined weeds rear their ugly heads again.  In just a day or two a new coating of dust from who know where settles on my formerly clean furniture. And the cycle begins again.  I find this process of constantly needing to clean tedious, time-consuming and sometimes downright uncomfortable.

Alas, this scenario is not limited to my home!  It is an even bigger problem when it comes to my heart.  My heart is susceptible to invasions of all kinds of dirt: pride, selfishness, self-centeredness, insensitivity, and I could go on and on!  When all of that is cluttering up my heart, it is hard to focus on God and His plans because I am so focused on me.  My heart can get so dirty that it tricks me into thinking that it is really not that dirty at all.   In reality, I’m trying to navigate life looking through a muddy windshield while pretending that I have a perfect view of the road ahead – a guarantee for messy, painful and possibly disastrous outcomes.

God knows that our hearts need cleaning!  Psalm 4:4 says, “When you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent.”  So, it seems step 1 is to take the time to examine your heart.  I’m not sure it has to be done on the bed, but the point it that it takes some quiet time with God to do this.   

Now, I tend to do a cursory search and apply my “Sharon” standard of cleanliness to my heart rather than doing a rigorous search for dirt based on God’s standard.  Fortunately, God has provided a helper for this task – the Holy Spirit!  Romans 8:26-27 says, “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans.  And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.”  My job is to ask for the Spirit’s help, invest the time required for the search and be painfully honest with myself about what I find.

Once I have searched out and acknowledge that dirt in my heart, it’s step 2 – time to get clean.  King David in Psalm 51:10 (The Message) says, “Soak me in your laundry and I’ll come out clean, scrub me and I’ll have a snow-white life…” Christ’s work on the cross is the cleaning “agent” that scrubs us clean. When I bring my examined, repentant heart to Him, His grace abounds!

Step 3 is found in the remainder of Psalm 51:10 (NIV) – “. . .and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” I think the word steadfast communicates the need to remain in a cleaning mode on an ongoing basis.  Like my patio, my heart needs cleaning on a regular basis.  Daily cleaning ensures no major accumulation of spiritual “gunk.”  What it boils down to is – every day is cleaning day!

The painting above could be a self-portrait of my heart!  There are some pretty dark places in there but also some areas that have been cleaned up thanks to the light shed on them through the power of the Spirit.  It’s not a pretty painting but I hope it helps me remember that every day is cleaning day! 

My prayer is that I will take the time each day to do the necessary and sometimes-painful search work and then invite Christ to do His cleansing work in my heart.  I pray the same for you![jetpack_subscription_form]