We're getting ready to leave for Hawaii tomorrow. I've been scrambling around getting things lined up, emails sent and the like so that once we're there-I can fully be there. It's been interesting to me that even in the midst of my busy to do list, God has still been showing me some things.
I put on a fairly cute outfit this morning-I even got the approval from Ben. I dropped him off, started running some errands, and in the midst of it, I kept smelling this weird smell. I could not for the life of me figure it out. These were clean clothes. They were hanging in my closet....so It couldn't be me.
But no matter where I went, to make some returns, to pick up some last minute things, I kept smelling something. I searched the car, I searched the house...looking for the smell. The saying goes, If you keep smelling something-It just might be you.
So I came home and took my clothes off and discovered indeed it was me. When I went to transfer the laundry so I could wash those nasty smelling jeans(laundry I needed to put in the dryer 4 days ago) I was greeted with the familiar smell. The same smell I had been smelling all day. Clothes that have sat too long. I had to wash them all over again and make sure I transfer them a whole lot more quickly this time around..
After I did that, and now changed into actually clean clothes, I'm beginning to see God using my love for analogies to teach me something. God has been showing me a lot about the process of getting to know Him. I come up with a plan about how Him and I are gonna spend some quality time, how I'm going to choose him over my insecurities, how I'm finally going to choose to forgive... etc. I take a few steps, and then tend to just get busy and forget. A few weeks later I remember my commitment-I see a half empty journal, or a brand new book I just bought, 3 pages read, a conversation I was going to have-and I remember that conversation God and I had.
Sometimes, even when I see it though I don't do anything. I wait for a few more weeks not really thinking of it. And then, lo and behold something in my life stinks. Typically the routine is to be convinced its someone else. " I'm washed! I'm clean!" But when I see a trend, in my relationships, in my heart no matter the situation...I begin to wonder-maybe it is me.. More times than not, it is. A weird spiritual mildew smell seems to accompany my heart.
At first, it might seem to me that God was the one that didn't do the good job. In other words, if my washer had really worked-then my clothes would never end up smelling bad, right? Wrong. God still is doing the work, and he's doing it perfectly, but if that work isn't embraced-if my part of this relationship isn't acted in-God has generously put a stinky smell in my life to remind me.
I'm excited for when the washer is done and when I can put all these clean clothes in the dryer. I'm especially when they come out clean and don't smell funky. I'm excited spiritually when I can see something in me that certainly needs cleaning, be cleaned and the next time its 'worn' I can tell that indeed it has been made new.
I see this in my heart with people and even in where I get my identity. I see it when I chose to love on someone rather than choosing to be insecure about who I am and leave them to be the ones to initiate, or when I decide I'm going to celebrate Ben rather than find a thousand ways to get him to celebrate me. Those are some of the ways God's been washing me.
Lucky for you and me, my nose and my Jesus refuse to let me stink for you all. Praise. You. Jesus.
**The Blog will be a wee bit quiet for the rest of week. We'll be off doing awesome things in a place we've never been.
Until Then!
Brittany
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