But It's Not Dirty!

If you’ve ever traveled with kids you know how quickly you can be thrown into a panic with just five little words…”I have to go potty!!” We were halfway through a road trip one day when our little Benaiah hollered those words out and like a Nascar driver, my husband Brandon got us to the nearest truck stop. He ran Benaiah in and (thankfully) got there just in time. When Niah was finished, Brandon had him stand at the back of the stall so he could avoid a potty emergency of his own, and gave Benaiah specific instructions not to move until he was done. Thirty seconds later, Brandon was horrified when Benaiah said “hey daddy watch this!” He turned around just in time to see Benaiah with a plunger stuck to side of his face like Bugs Bunny in an old Looney Tunes episode. Through his shock, Brandon managed a quick, “Niah nooooooo! That’s so dirty!!!”, but before he could reach him, Benaiah had suctioned the side of his face three or four more times. With a plunger. In a truck stop. He stopped to look at the plunger and said “But daddy, it’s not dirty!” When Benaiah realized how horrified Brandon was, he said “It’s ok daddy, I’ll wipe it off.” He proceeded to wipe his face on his sleeve as if that would make everything better. Brandon carried Benaiah to the sink and washed him the best he could all the while trying to explain that even if he couldn’t see anything, the plunger was still dirty. Disgustingly dirty. He explained that nothing but soap and water…lots and lots of it…would clean Benaiah. It didn’t seem like a big deal to him because it looked clean, but Brandon (like any of us) knew that thing was filthy, and since Benaiah touched it, he was now filthy.

We all understand how disgusting a truck stop plunger is. We know that nothing about that encounter left Benaiah clean. Just the thought is probably making some of your stomachs turn right now (I know mine is!). But to Benaiah it was no big deal. He was able to overlook it because it seemed small. It seemed clean. He thought it was as fun and funny as when Bugs Bunny does it. But his daddy knew the truth. He knew that the plunger incident had left Benaiah filthy, and he wanted nothing more than to clean his son. He wouldn’t let him go on with his day until he had washed him clean.

I think this is how God looks at our sin. The things that seem harmless to us. The things that we think are clean. We think they’re fun or funny or that they’re just no big deal. The sins that seem small and so we’re wiling to overlook them in our lives. Some of them come so naturally that we do them without thinking. But our Father, our daddy, looks at us and says…”No! Don’t do it! That’s so dirty!” Often we are so focused on what we’re doing that we don’t even hear Him. We totally miss that He’s trying to nudge us towards cleanliness. Towards holiness.

Or maybe we hear Him then we step back for just a second and take a look at what we’re doing. It seems clean. It doesn’t look like sin…and so we go back and do it again and again. We ignore that nudge from the Holy Spirit and say “No daddy, it’s not dirty!”. Sometimes it’s passing on the gossip someone else passed on to us. Maybe it’s being envious of someone’s job or car or Instagram followers. It could be allowing eyes to linger a second longer on someone other than your spouse. Letting pride take over your thoughts and actions. Coarse joking, a sharp tongue. The list could go on and on and we would probably be surprised at how many would apply to us. It’s easy to justify our actions by pointing out the sins that other people are committing. The really big ones that are obviously dirty and the things we know we would never do. We look at ourselves in the mirror and think really we’re pretty clean. We don’t see any residue from our actions and believe that they must be ok.

But our Father knows how dirty the “plunger” is. He knows when we have that filth on us, our ability to be used by Him is hindered. He looks at the big sins and sees sin. He looks at the little ones and sees sin. He doesn’t rate our wrongdoings and give us a pass because someone else is doing something worse. He doesn’t overlook our choices and let us keep doing them because the mess they make is small. He sees the filth. God knows that we can never truly clean ourselves without the love and careful hand of our Father. We may try to wipe it away, but without Him it’s still filth.

And yet, miraculously, He loves us anyway. He says that we’re not too far gone, we’re not unusable or unlovable because of our actions. God says that if we’ll let it, the grime and filth and nastiness can be washed away. And like any good daddy, He cleans us. He takes the dirty, icky, impure things and washes them away. He makes us fit to do His work and doesn’t keep reminding us of how dirty we were.

All filth needs cleaned off, none is beneficial to keep on your face. None is beneficial to overlook, to keep in your life. No matter how small, take it to daddy.