What's clean? By Robin Littau

Tonight I was able to rest in a delightful, candle-lite bath. It was toasty warm, filled with overflowing bubbles from an air bubble machine, that I dust off once a year to use. I had my phone singing worship songs to my ears, filling the tiny room, and my quiet mind. My husband was super sweet to keep my four kids, ages 3-8, from entering this blissful domain. Who knew bath time could be so majestic!

When I have one of these “special baths,” I get out all the essential beauty supplies: Deep conditioner for my hair, a face mask, and a foot scrubber. As I was scrubbing my feet, noticing all the ingrained dirt on my heels, I thought of how wonderful it was that they came clean. How wonderful it is that we can just sit in some water, with a mere soaking, and come out clean. When we bust out our loofa‘s, the result is even more dazzling clean skin that smells fantastic. Being clean is a wonderful thing!

I’m also a woman who’s constantly cleaning. Just ask anyone who knows me. I can barely refrain from grabbing the cup out of your hand and rushing it to the sink (that part makes me laughJ ). However, regardless of how clean I am externally, I have found it to be an exhausting 15 yr. journey in discovering how to be clean internally, in my heart. I tried the “do it yourself” method. I was the worst “heart house cleaner” I could’ve hired. I tried the “hire your friends at church” to help me clean “me” up, but sometimes they made a bigger mess. I tried refusing to take a bath, like a stubborn toddler, but the smell of my repeating dirty behaviors made me feel sick. I even tried to cover it with the perfume of “busy good works,“ still no luck. So, I finally resorted to begging.

Who? God of course! I begged Him to make me clean from the inside out. I knew I had to do good things, be good for God to help me, work harder, but….after all that exhausting effort, I learned that He didn’t want my goodness, nor my “help.” He just wanted me to come, dirt and all, and allow Him to wash me in the forgiveness that His Son Jesus (God in the flesh) had already provided for me! He did this years ago through dying for my sins at the Cross, outside Jerusalem, conquering death for me, brought from my stinky defiling sin against Him, and rising above it on the third day. At last some victory over the “impossible to remove” stains that my sin brings.

He alone washes away our sins. Sins are the dirt in our hearts, but worse. They’re the rotten things that stink up the whole garbage can and room they dwell in. It’s the stinky stuff inside an infected wound. Ready to puke yet? You can’t hide it, it has to be removed. I has to be cleaned. Even if you cry! Imagine you‘re child having an infected wound and refusing to let you clean it…no loving parent would leave that right? God does. He lets us choose to allow Him to help us. Love offers a choice. No sane person would choose a lost limb to gangrene over a quick scrub with bubbles? Or would we? Do we refuse to be clean inside? How often do we love our infected wounds more than soap? Do we invite our Creator God to come into the painful, infected parts of our aching souls, and clean them? Do we go to Him daily and let Him wash us from the grime of this world that we live in? Do we guard our eyes from unclean things, the gates to our hearts, or do we just tell our kids to? Do we take spiritual baths in spending close times with God as much as we take physical baths for our jobs or husbands? We should.

Regardless of how dirty we may be, or how dirty we may get, or how it happened, we have access to a clean water bath whenever we choose. We can go to Him in a mess, and come out pretty smelling and dazzling clean. The more baths you take, the cleaner you stay. All I do is ask! He cleans my heart with His unconditional love and forgiveness freely, as I continue to go to Him for it. “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.“ I recommend a daily morning water splash in reading God’s word when you wake up, and another before bedtime. Washing your mind throughout the day in prayer brings peace and keeps your eyes on your life Provider.

I’m ending my evening with the Lyrics from one of my bath songs, “I will rise,“ from 25 Worship Songs Vol. 2. “There’s a peace I’ve come to know, though my heart and flesh may fail. There’s an anchor for my soul, I can say it is well. Jesus has overcome, and the grave is overwhelmed. The victory is won. He is risen from the dead. And I will rise when He calls my name, no more sorrow, no more pain. I will rise on eagles wings, before my God fall on my knees, and rise.“

Now, it is well with my soul, and I know the Anchor. I expect things to get dirty. My car, my driveway, my garage, my bathroom, my floors, my laundry, why exclude my heart. But now I also know how to get my heart clean and where to go. I go to Jesus, the lover of my soul, who declares me clean, who makes me whole, who hugs me in my mess, and makes me new, from the inside out. Matthew 8:2-3 says, “Behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean." Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, "I am willing; be cleansed." Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.” Just ask!

"As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us."(Psalms 103:12)