It was such a gorgeous day out this past Saturday that I decided to try to get some spring cleaning done at my house while Kyleigh was taking a nap. A couple of things you should know about Kyleigh if you don't already - she is an incredibly light sleeper and she has super sonic ears. This translates into the house needing to stay quiet while she naps. Fortunately, our house has three floors. So while Kyleigh is asleep on the top floor I can make as much noise in the basement.
I decided to start in what I find to be one of the dirtiest corners of our den - the corner by the door out to our backyard. It was incredibly dusty and dirty in that little corner so I began to dust and go through the little cupboard we have over there - trying to throw out things we really don't need. Once I threw out what we didn't need and organized what we decided to keep I had quite a bit of extra space in the little cupboard.
Now I'm one of those people that loves to "hide" things in cupboards or drawers as much as possible. So, I was trying to decide what to put in the cupboard while still having it close by to grab if I needed it. I decided that the majority if not all of the dog toys could go in the cupboard - my two dogs rarely play with any toys they are too fascinated with Kyleigh now. Then I found a dirty fan that was sitting by the cupboard for when it gets super warm (which until this week it hadn't been!).
Since I'd just taken the time to clean out the cupboard and had wiped everything down there was no way I wanted to put that dusty, dirty fan in my clean cupboard. I mentioned to Jon that I wondered if it could be opened up and cleaned out and a few short minutes later he had the fan opened up as much as it could be.
After getting a rag and water and trying to clean it in my den while getting dirt over everything, I decided to move it into the bathroom over the sink. After a few minutes of brushing the dirt off with an old toothbrush and using the rag to get everything off, my fan looked pretty good!
So the lessons learned...I'm getting there! While I was finishing up the last of the fan cleaning, I looked into the area with the motor and saw how dirty it still looked (not that I could do anything about that). Outwardly, my fan looked/still looks so pretty and clean. But inwardly, my fan was so ugly and dirty. I think by now you probably get where I'm going with this.
It made me stop and think about how so many times in our lives we clean up so well - whether it is to go to church, or just to talk with friends, colleagues, you name it. While the inside of us is still so dirty. We haven't taken the time that we need to have God clean out our bad thoughts, our meanness, our selfishness - the list could go on and on. Unlike my fan that still has a dirty inside, we don't have to remain dirty on the inside! God wants us to be clean all the time, by constantly confessing our sin. He wants us to live lives that our free from the guilt and the sin that we get caught up in so much of the time.
I know it is so much easier to have the facade that everything is clean on the inside - we know how to talk the talk and walk the walk - at least on the outside but God knows what is in our hearts. And can I go a step further and say that especially if you are a parent, your little ones are learning from you and they probably unwittingly see a lot more of what is inside your heart than what you think. It is so easy to put a show on for others when you just see them every once in awhile, but it is so much harder to put a show on all of the time around your family - which is why it is so important to have your heart clean daily so that you don't have to put a show on!
I also know we are humans and even when we are constantly seeking God and His will and trying to live a godly life that we are going to slip up - it happens! Fortunately, we can start the process all over and ask for forgiveness and keep on trying to live our lives for God.
I could go on and on, but I think you get the point. So, what turned into a simple spring cleaning - which by the way was all I got done that day, turned into a valuable reminder to me on how we need to constantly keep our hearts clean and seek God daily!
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