This and about half a load of "clean" bowls, cups, and plates that were covered in stuck on quinoa, oatmeal, and flakes of leftover split pea soup. Kind of makes you want a 15+ year old, washed-out teal interior "Hotpoint" dishwasher, doesn't it?
It was about all I could take this morning. The munchkin has a major cold and didn't want to be put down. We had a stack of dishes from yesterday's small group dinner, and Patrick's grandparents were stopping by in a half hour on their way down to Powhattan. We had been up late. There may or may not have been arguing involved.
I tried singing: "Why should I feel discouraged..." Didn't work. Tried being thankful for having a dishwasher when our Iraqi friend up the street yesterday told me how she used to cook and clean for her husband's family of 12 people without one. Didn't work.
Finally, I sighed. God, I'm tired and am doing work that I counted on being done. It's not fair I have to clean up what is supposed to have been cleaned.
That's when I heard God whispered, Beloved, that's how I feel sometimes.
My soul quieted. While I know God's grace is immeasurably more than mine, that he has unending patience with us as we learn, that he is committed to see his good work in us completed, I knew these past few days, I have grieved his redeeming Father-heart.
I'm supposed to have been cleaned.
I chose a long time ago to try and think like he thinks (i.e. repent!) and live like he lived (i.e. believe the good news). I've trusted that he cleaned up the mess of a heart I was unable to fix with perfection.
However, this week, He has found me with stuck on bits of anger, flakes of pride and cynicism, leftover hurt and bitterness.
Instead of a vessel clean and ready to be used when He needs me, I've had to be washed, again and again by his grace and by the grace of others whom I've hurt.
As I put away the final dishes, I needed a quick fix to keep my sweet stuffy girl occupied, so I grabbed for an apple and started peeling. This is what I found:
It was too close after the dishwasher revelation to be a coincidence. I flashed back to the passage I had read in the Message (Luke 3) yesterday during my quiet time:
"John, Zachariah’s son, [was] out in the desert at the time, received a message from God. He went all through the country around the Jordan River preaching a baptism of life-change leading to forgiveness of sins...It’s your life that must change, not your skin... God can make children from stones if he wants. What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming?"
Or, as it's written in the New International Version, "Produce fruit in keeping with repentance."
Dishes that have been washed should be clean, ready for service, hospitality, the receiving and giving of nourishment.
Fruit that is beautifully formed from a healthy tree should be ready to be served, to nourish.
In other words, what comes out of my life should be a reflection of the identity I've been given.
If it's true that I'm washed, then why do my words drip with criticism, my actions crust over with impatience?
If it's true that I've changed to align my life with the one who gave His life on the tree, then why is the fruit of my heart riddled with wormy resentment?
So here are the questions I'm left with this weekend:
In what ways does my life reflect the washing I've received?
What still lingers that shouldn't be part of a life cleaned and ready for use that needs to be washed again in God's grace?
In what ways does the fruit of my life reflect the health of my heart?
What do I need to repent of, agree with God about, so that the fruit of my life can be sweet to those who receive it?
May this November find us all more like clean, ready vessels, more like harvests spilled over at thanksgiving feasts...