Spotless

I broke a sweat Swiffering the kitchen floor last week. Maybe I wouldn't have had to work so hard if the last time the floor was swept and mopped wasn't three months ago. (Gross, I know, but no one will ever mistake me for Mrs. Clean.)

Days later, as my husband prepared our Valentine's Day dinner, he said, Sorry, you're probably going to have to sweep again.

Not a big deal when we're only talking about a day or two's worth of kitchen crumbs. That's a quick job. When it has accumulated over time, then we're talking scrub-worthy effort.

I feel the same way about my spiritual life. It doesn't take much for God to get the gunk out of my life when I come to Him daily with it. But when it's been days, weeks, months or years, the process requires more effort, more sweat and most likely some tears.

1 John 1:9 says "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." (NIV)

I admit, I'm not too faithful at confessing my sins. Sometimes, I delude myself into thinking I don't have any. Then, I get a gentle (or not so gentle) reminder from God, and for a time, I'm humbled. Until I become comfortable enough with my life to stop confessing my sins.

What would my life look like if I daily came to God and asked Him to not only forgive me of the sins I could remember but to show me the sins I didn't even know I was committing?

We're entering the season of Lent today, and I haven't given much thought to how I can intentionally honor the Lord during this time and set apart something for Him. This may be the place to start: "Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." Psalm 139:23-24 (NIV)

My heart longs to sing this truth each day: "Whiter than snow, yes, whiter than snow, now wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow."

He's always going to be starting with dirt when He begins the washing process. How much dirt is up to me.

The sigh moment

Raising two kids wouldn't be so hard if one of them wasn't a toddler who was constantly demanding her own way. Her first-born nature and mine seem always to be wrestling for control. She loves to help with dishes, and some days, I feel like we're elbowing each other for a better position at the sink -- her goal, to play in the water and mine, to actually clean some dishes! She's also in the bossy stage. I feel like her pet sometimes. "Sit." "C'mere." Will I soon be asked to "roll over" or "shake"?

No matter how crazy the day has been, though, there's this moment at the end of the day that makes it all worthwhile. It starts with kisses and hugs at bedtime, followed by an "I wuv you" as one of us puts her in her crib. As soon as the door to the bedroom closes, my husband and I look at each other and almost audibly let our breath out. He calls it "the sigh moment." The work part of the day is over and it's time to relax. Even if our son is still awake, it's still a more calm time in our household.

Thinking about the sigh moment helps me get through those everyone's-tired-and-cranky-and-there's-too-much-to-do days. That's my reward.

So, too, in the Christian life. Walking with the Lord, working for Him, serving in His name can be exhausting and seemingly unrewarding, at times. But we have confidence that when our time is done, we'll have a sigh moment with Him. Not just a "well done, good and faithful servant," although coming from God Himself, that would be enough, but eternity to live with Him.

"Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." Revelation 21:3-4

Tone deaf

I started re-reading C.S. Lewis' "The Screwtape Letters" this week because I need a reminder of the subtle ways we, Christians, can tear each other apart, almost without knowing it.

I've been thinking heavily about this passage lately:

In civilised life domestic hatred usually expresses itself by saying things which would appear quite harmless on paper (the words are not offensive) but in such a voice, or at such a moment, that they are not far short of a blow in the face. To keep this game up you ... must see to it that each ... has a sort of double standard. Your patient must demand that all his own utterances are to be taken at their face value and judged simply on the actual words, while at the same time judging all his mother's utterances with the fullest and most oversensitive interpretation of the tone and the context and the suspected intention.

Sometimes I forget how easily a tone can change a conversation, and I wonder if the way I say something often makes it difficult for the other person to actually hear what I'm saying. And vice versa.

One afternoon this week, I walked into the house with an armload of groceries. Everyone else in the house was napping. Until I walked in. The first words out of my husband's mouth were "I need to teach you how to enter a house." His tone wasn't cruel, but I sensed some annoyance, because the door slammed behind me and everyone woke up. My reaction was less than cordial and for a few minutes, until I realized how childish I was being, I sulked around the house and began compiling my mental list of grievances against my husband. All because of how I interpreted his tone. All he was really saying was that I could have entered the house more quietly, and he was willing to demonstrate. I blew it out of proportion.

Maybe this is why Scripture tells us: Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. (Colossians 4:6)

And: A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. (Proverbs 15:1)

I'm hoping to be a better listener, tuning out a person's tone to get to the heart of what they're saying. I'm not sure it's easy, but I'm willing to try.

Grace in the common place

"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." -- 2 Corinthians 12:9

I've been learning, recently, through the book our women's Bible study is reading, "Lies Women Believe," that God's grace is sufficient for me. Since becoming a Christian, I think I've known this about the big things of life, but I'm learning that it applies to the everyday, common things as well. In the book, the author describes several circumstances and then writes after those descriptions, "His grace is sufficient for me." Here are some of mine:

When dinner was supposed to be ready 10 minutes ago and I haven't started it yet, His grace is sufficient for me.

When the toddler is screaming, "Mommy, mommy, mommy" from the top of her lungs and I'm sitting right next to her, His grace is sufficient for me.

When the baby is crying and won't go to sleep while the toddler just filled her diaper with poop, His grace is sufficient for me.

When the house is a disaster and I've spent my last bit of energy, His grace is sufficient for me.

When I just want to scream because the stress level's high, His grace is sufficient for me.

When I'm tired and hungry and trying to get dinner on the table and the water boils over and the baby needs attention and the toddler is patting my butt saying, "Mommy, mommy, mommy" and I'm ready to throw in the towel, His grace is sufficient for me.

I'm sure there're are many more, but those are what rise to the top tonight. Feel free to add your own.

Life In Progress

A place for everything and everything in its place. Our motto these days is more like "no place for anything and nothing in its place."

Thanks to Christmas, the addition of a new baby and traveling, our house is far from orderly. We still have suitcases (empty) in the bedroom, mounds of laundry that seem to multiply overnight, toys in every room of the house and piles of papers and other miscellaneous objects that seem to have no home.

This bugs me. I like order. I enjoy putting things where they go. I want to be able to walk through the house without worrying about tripping over a stray toy or cup.

I'm thinking that's not going to happen until Phil and I are empty-nesters. Realistically, it's probably possible sooner than that, but when I look around the house, I wonder if it's always going to be like this. When we lived in our first apartment, our stuff was packed into it in an out-of-control, embarrassing sort of way. Then, our daughter was born and the disorder was more like chaos. When we moved to the house we now live in, we couldn't believe all the room we had. We've learned, though, that when you upgrade, you find a way to fill the space you have. Add to that the birth of our son and we're back to feeling a little like sardines.

Maybe that means we have too much stuff. Thanks to ample storage space in the attic, we have a few boxes of things we haven't used since we've been married. They're mostly decorative things, I think, like picture frames and wall hangings, although there's also a box of music boxes I've collected since I was a girl that haven't seen the light of day in close to 10 years. I've never been much of a decorator, but I want to be able to display these things and create a homey atmosphere. Right now, the atmosphere is modern toddler, at best; messy family, at worst. I fear that our kids will be 16 before we're able to show off their baby pictures or that Phil and I will be celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary before I get around to putting up our wedding pictures.

We're definitely a work in progress when it comes to our home, and I know this happens to most families with young children. It's just hard for me to accept because I'm not a work-in-progress type of girl. I like to finish what I start. This was the hardest time management lesson to learn as a reporter. Most of the time, I had to have three or four stories "in progress" while I waited for phone calls to be returned or interviews to be scheduled. If I had waited until one story was finished before I started the next one, I would never have made deadline and probably would have been quickly out of a job.

Most of the time my life feels like a work in progress, too. Some days, I wish I was a lot closer to complete than I am. I'm often reminded of how much work is left to do, especially when I say something I don't really mean, become overwhelmed by the little things, or ignore a need when I could help meet it.

I'm grateful for other work-in-progress people in my life, who even if they're a little closer to complete than I am, remind me that nobody's perfect and nobody will be this side of Heaven. I'm drawn to those kind of people, who easily admit their faults and acknowledge they don't have it all together.

Maybe that's why I've always loved Philippians 1:6: "being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."

Someday I'll be complete. Until then, I can rest in the truth that every day is bringing me a little closer to that end.