How Are Your Pipes?

In my last post, I attempted to demonstrate that you don’t get to select how you will be separated from your faults, your weakness…your sin.

I mean, sure – you can take a crack at certain painless daily actions to try to stay on top of it all, and you might even brag and tell people about those actions, and you will paint them as sacrificial and “hard.”

and that is good…I mean, the bragging about your sacrifices is kinda odd…BUT…hey…

you surely shouldn't just sit on your couch and expect a daily shower of perfection dust to just sprinkle down on you and take away your iniquity…while you chug a beer.

So, go ahead…boast about your humility…(try Facebook…it is GREAT for that)…

And while you are doing THAT:

Our Father will be lining up the heavy artillery fire.  Oh…I am sorry – that sounds so brutal.  OK…how is this: 

you study, and The Lord gets your midterm ready.

And…then we’ll get to see how much you learned via your little daily exercises…now, won’t we?  Hm.  He will give you something to crow about…

Or blog about…

You are not allowed to PICK your purification.  

You aren't permitted the choice of “Well, I am very prideful, so I will just hide in my house, nice and safe, and the world will just forget about me, and I will forget about me, and it won’t hurt at all.  It will just go away.  OK.  Good.  Phew.  God will never see me in here…in my house.”

You cannot hide.

This is like your son telling you, “Ground me in my room.”

Have you SEEN his room?

Exactly. 

Not only can you not hide…but…

The Lord can read your MIND.

-BLAMMO!-

Embarrassing, right…cause YOU KNOW what you were thinking about…Ew.  

We try to read our kid’s mind, and we claim that we can, but – come on…you are just hoping you are right…you have NO idea what that kid is up to…

But, OUR Father IS right about YOU.

But, worse than that…worse than THAT –

He knows what you don’t even know you know.  The Lord knows what you are thinking about that you are not even thinking about,

Take a few moments and process that...put your brains back together... I’ll wait.

(Sometimes coffee helps….)

And THAT my friend, the fact that we are completely oblivious to our deepest disgustingness is why we need the heavy artillery fire….the BIG GUNS –

To BLAST that out of there.

And it WILL FEEL like a blast.  Jesus will not tickle you under the arm and say, “No more…kay?  No more of that kinda stuff?  Right?”

Nope.

Just be glad that Jesus is a mindreader.

Because what if ALL that GROSSNESS just collected in there…deep in YOU…all that naughtiness…

Picture the drain in your tub…all that hair, bunched up in the drain and wrapped around the top of that army man with one leg that is wedged down in there, kinda sideways, and you cannot get that out there, but there is enough of an opening that water can still get down…but it just takes the tub like…I dunno…maybe 12…13 hours to drain after a bath…but – HEY – it is draining, so it is cool, and your husband doesn't use that bathroom, and the kids think that is normal….

And, you think it is the hairy army man causing the problem, and you are really okay with the situation…you just keep unwrapping a few of the hairs from around his head, and you make the opening a LITTLE bit bigger…until it starts to collect again, and then you do it again…small steps…getting you by…I mean, it is annoying, always having to bend over and pull on scummy human hair, but it can be done on the fly.  I mean, you can actually reach the drain – from the toilet – so…

but – one day – the tub won’t drain at all…

You are so dead.  So, you rearrange the food budget for the month a bit (pancakes every other day), and you free up some plumber cash…

and the plumber comes, and he uses apparently highly expensive tools made of gold to release the army man, and he gets it out, and the comedian/plumber is so impressed by what he finds hanging on the OTHER side of the army man, the side that was down IN the drain, the part you couldn't see…that he has to BRING it to you so you can share in that moment with him, that moment when he is holding up a root system of hair, candy wrappers, one of those little plastic covers to the top of a razor, and a broken water balloon, and he displays it in front of  you like it is a 12-inch long Big Mouth Bass, and he asks you, while snorting, “Did you have a party in the tub?” 

And– inside your head - but with your head actually moving back and forth a bit, you mimic him in a fast high voice, “Did you have a party in the tub?” 

Hm.

We don’t take the time to clean up our pipes…because you don’t even know half of what is in there.  You think it is just a matter of what we see each day…stuff you can fix while also doing something else. 

What is more – you have likely adjusted yourself to operating with the clog caused by ALL of what is in there.  You have just resigned yourself to cleaning at the very top of the drain - the visible part - every time you use the toilet.

We are complicating our lives.  Going to the bathroom is not supposed to be so much work.

I am a secret mess.  You are, too.

But…we are good actors.  Your neighbor doesn't know about your mess, so don’t worry.  Your best friend “might” be on to it, but you can trust her not to say anything to you because her job is to build you up, and you will stop calling her if she starts telling you the truth,

BUT, your HUSBAND –

oh…

he has been sent by Jesus Himself to get you into heaven, sister…

so YOUR HUSBAND has God-given super powers when it comes to you. 

He can see some of what Jesus sees.

Not ALL of it (deep sigh of relief)…

But…Husband can see a lot of creepy stuff about you that you are not willing to deal with…

And he has been telling you about this stuff for YEARS,

And you “heard” him.  You DID hear it.  Yes.  You did.  Yes you did.

– just buy more shoes. 

“That strange feeling in my soul must be related to a shoe-shortage.”

Jesus knows what is in the drain…
Jesus knows what is in the pipes...

Jesus knows your husband is right about you…

Jesus knows you will ignore your husband because husband is not perfect either, so you are going to just make yourself right by making husband wrong…

And then you will make yourself feel better…at some shoe store…and you are so desperate to get to the shoe store that you are going to take your kids with you to the shoe store….

And…Jesus is – once again - way ahead of you.

He is waiting at the shoe store.  Jesus is.

Ha. 

Ha.

Go ahead.  It’s your midterm.