Grab your broom and dust pan – it is time to start cleaning.
Okay, where is the mop? Fill the bucket with hot water. Get the Lysol. Pour it in. Start scrubbing.
How about those cabinets? When was the last time they were wiped down? Get the Oxyclean and start scrubbing!
Oh man, look at those windows! Is it foggy outside or is that dirt and grime? Windex and towels please!
Okay, on to the appliances. Clean the oven and stove. How about that toaster oven and the dark recesses of the tray at the bottom of it. There’s that bagel!
Whew, I’m getting tired. Let’s check out the refrigerator. Empty those shelves. Pull them out. Check to see if those left-overs are still good….yeah, I mean the ones from last Thanksgiving.
Was our ceiling fan always black? Nope. It was white! Better clean that too.
Alright, almost done. Let’s check the cabinets to see if there are any small appliances we are not using. Oh, right. The fondue pot. That seemed like a good idea. The George Foreman Grill – yep, another brilliant purchase if I used it. Man..where did we get all this stuff. Out! Out! Out!
Okay, let’s look around…..
Not bad….
Next room!
Tired? Imagine actually doing it. It could easily take the whole day. Sometimes jobs like that seem so big that we will avoid them for years (only making the problem worse) until we finally get so disgusted with the filth that we decide to do something about it.
I wish things were different with our spiritual lives but sometimes we approach things the same way. We let sins accumulate. We look past the build-up of transgressions. We let slide the things that we know need “cleaning”. We neglect the deep recesses of our hearts because it is too messy to bring them out into the light and ask God to do something about them. As unpleasant as housework can be for us, we often would rather do that than do a spiritual “spring-cleaning”. Yep, let’s tuck that sin away. Can we just put these attitudes behind some other stuff so we don’t have to look at them? Oh, and that greed, we can store that on the top shelf, out of sight. We know just the perfect place for that malice and our judgmental heart where no light will ever shine on it. Fill in the blank on what you have neglected.
So what is at stake when we don’t ask God to help us clean out the grimy places of our heart?
19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20
Hmmm…….
The temple of the Holy Spirit.
The TEMPLE of the Holy Spirit
The temple of THE HOLY SPIRIT
Sounds like a place we would want to keep clean. Sounds like a place where we would want to strive to keep pure every day. Sounds like we have God’s Spirit within us and that His being there only happened because Jesus paid a great price for us. Sounds like if we are going to truly glorify God, we are going to have to give ourselves over and over again to the commitment of living holy before Him.
Yep. We must keep God’s temple clean. How much value is there in doing so? Much more than cleaning your physical house. As a matter of fact, can you think of anything more important to do with your time?
For Him,
Rob