Today I went to Winnipeg on an errand for Janet (my incredible wife), and on my way home I stopped by Home Depot. I was curious if the shelving units we wanted were on sale as we were in desperate need of shelving and the desperation always increases when things are on sale. You see we’ve wanted to tackle the wore-torn looking rooms of our kids and help them “organize” their belongings. Parents all understand that “organizing” is a pleasant way of saying “It’s time to throw away the McDonalds toys that take up space”. As I walked to the storage section of Home Depot, my desperation for shelving increased as the ones we were after were $5 off per shelf! I felt the “Ebenezer Scrooge” begin to jump for joy and crawl out of my skin as I loaded up my cart and hurried off to the check out before anyone could tell me there was a mistake in the pricing. When I finally arrived home after calling my wife, using my Bluetooth device that I got on sale, we embarked on assembling the units.
Units assembled, kids excited about a project, now to enter into the unknown abyss of my children’s rooms. This was almost overwhelming! After removing the remains of what could only be characterized as a petrified banana, shrivelled and rotten; Janet and I realized that the day had come for the annual purging of the kids rooms. And purge we did, if I recall correctly we were able to amass four garbage bags of everything from garbage to clothes for the local MCC thrift store. Garbage Bags filled with memories of gifts from past Christmas’ and birthdays; were ready to be sent off to become landfill or someone else’ purging project in the future. We worked at it for five hours on our knees cleaning, hearing the harping tired complaints of children wanting to just go out and play, but in the end it was worth it. The rooms were clean, we are happy and so are the kids.
1 Corinthians 5:6-8 (Amplified Bible)
6[About the condition of your church] your boasting is not good [indeed, it is most unseemly and entirely out of place]. Do you not know that [just] a little leaven will ferment the whole lump [of dough]?
7Purge (clean out) the old leaven that you may be fresh (new) dough, still uncontaminated [as you are], for Christ, our Passover [Lamb], has been sacrificed.
8Therefore, let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with leaven of vice and malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened [bread] of purity (nobility, honor) and sincerity and [unadulterated] truth.
I believe we all need to evaluate ourselves in life. Solomon tells us there is a time for everything and as we were purging our children’s rooms I was thinking of the last time I purged something in my life. You see purging the rooms indicates that there were items that were of no value and in actuality they were detracting from the whole because of their messiness. So what is messy in my life that is detracting from the whole of me? What is the yeast that is working its way through my walk with Christ, my relationship with others, which needs to be purged? After all, if I am truly moving towards Christ-likeness I should be purging more regularly shouldn’t I?
Take sometime this week and ask God to show you what area of life you need to be working through, and don’t be shy about it, tell someone what you are up to. You may find that a wonderful thing begins to happen…authentic Christianity!
