sippee cups and God

I hate cleaning house. Detest. Despise. Dread. I don't have enough negative adjectives in my repertoire to adequately describe my nasty emotions about cleaning. I do it because it must be done and I do it as well as possible because that's the right way to do it. However, anytime that I am cleaning, I am battling a particularly foul attitude. It's just how I am and haven't been able to change it in spite of many attempts to view cleaning in a more positive light.

Because of the foul attitude, I spend a lot of time praying while I'm cleaning. To confess and try to overcome the guilt associated with the negative attitude. Because of all the time I spend praying while cleaning multiplied by all the cleaning time involved in showing a house, God often speaks to me through the mundane tasks.

This week it was a sippee cup. NO JOKE! I was washing dishes....which I hate less than I used to so I guess that's progress. I was dumping and rinsing sippee cups....no big deal and tossing them in the dishwasher. Then I came to a long lost sippee cup. You parents out there know what I found inside...chunky, stinky, white, moldy cheese. So then I had to hold my breath and work for quite some time on cleaning up the cup so that it could be usable. That's when God got my attention and taught me a little lesson about sin.

You see, daily confession is like washing the fresh dishes. We confess our sins, get rinsed off and are good to go. Very quick, easy, and fairly painless. But the sin that we allow to fester and grow and hide becomes the stinky cheese. It is harder to totally rinse away, and it is a chore to completely remove it and become usable again. God desires a daily confession and cleansing from us so that we are constantly yielded and usable. When we allow sin to overtake us, it is much harder for God to use us.

There it is....a lesson about sin from a nasty, stinky, gross sippee cup.

Sin and Poop

God makes the weirdest connections in my head. Lately we have been occasionally trying to potty train Abby, the two year old. She will not poop in the potty, denies having gone in her diaper, runs and hides. Because she is our fourth child, we know that this is a normal phase of potty training and find it very amusing. So tonight I smelled the tell-tale odor of a used diaper. I asked, "Abby did you poop?" Her reply was an emphatic, loud, "NO!" as she took off running in the opposite direction.

So as I was in hot pursuit of the fastest toddler on two feet, God made an interesting connection for me. "No matter how hard you try to hide your sin, no matter where you run to, or how much you deny the action, it will reek. Sin is a stench to God that cannot be hid or denied or run away from. It can only be confessed, removed, and cleansed." Much like poop in a toddler's diaper.

The last preview service, an awesome insight, and an embarrassing confession

Today was our final preview service at The Crossroads. We had 68 people show up to worship with us. How exciting! It is impossible for me to believe that we will be launching full-time in 3 weeks. This is the adventure of a lifetime! I am blessed to share it with an incredible team of people.

On another note, I had a couple of deep thoughts today that I thought I'd share. The first one is sort-of a one-liner that God spoke to me during Shawn's awesome sermon today. Now understand that I have heard this sermon on multiple occasions, I am simply a slow learner. He used Genesis 12:1, "Then the Lord told Abram, "Leave your country, your relatives, and your father's house, and go to the land that I will show you." I have meditated on this passage many times - about Abram's faith in stepping out into the unknown, etc. but today I had a new insight that I thought was pretty awesome. "You don't have to know the destination to begin the journey." I like to know all the details before I jump off into anything and God just spoke to me about walking the journey with Him, not worrying so much about the destination and the details. Just enjoy being surprised by where God takes me.

The Gospel According to Abby

God often uses my children to show me truths that I have not quite fully grasped. Recently he used my 2 year old daughter, Abby, to remind me that there is nothing in my life that is hidden from HIM.

So, here's the story:
I am slowly weaning Abby from her pacifier. She is not excited about this new phase of her life. We were in the kitchen and she spotted a pacifier that had somehow ended up on the floor. She immediately grabbed it and hid it behind her back. (which was turned towards me). Then she turned to face me and said, "No, I not got my binky. I not know where it go." And proceeded to dash down the hall (once again with binky in my plain line of sight as she is facing away from me again.)

God used that moment to immediately convict me that I do the exact same thing. He continually leads me away from sin. (like I am leading Abby to give up her pacifier) However, it seems that I often spot an opportunity for sin, contemplate it carefully, engage in it, then tell God I didn't do it. Much like Abby telling me that she did not have her binky, even though I could plainly see it.

So - here's the point - I am praying that I will understand God's viewpoint and try harder to align my life with Him.