Messy Monday: HELLO MY NAME IS... MUD

 

Our eyes awaken to a place so bright,

and this shock of white tells Doppler it'll be alright

because when her bark breaks into the dark

and the door is opened,

her hope is that her

pawfuls of indiscretion

will be wiped away

and she can play

in the glory of the

living room.

 

 Sorry, I've been watching a lot of slam poetry lately, and I wanted to play with it a bit.

 

 But it's true. Carefree, Doppler runs in glorious circles around our snow-laden yard and I let her and I laugh because I know what awaits, and I choose to ignore it: the muddy season.

 

We had a glimpse of it the other day, before the snowfall in which I now revel. And since muddy days with muddy paws create a mud masterpiece on my floor much like melted chocolate on the digits of a toddler hand, we relegate the furry sinner to the back porch until she is suitable for inside living.

She tries to avoid the mud. I'm not kidding. I have seen the dog bound over mudpits with the agility of a gazelle, but the mud is unavoidable and will continue to be so until sod is laid in the coming months.

So the pup is treated much like those poor souls too dirty for church. Surely we all must spend some time in the "back porch" cleaning ourselves up a bit before we can come into the church like respectable sinners.

Respectable sinners?

Cleaning ourselves?


And if you don't think you fall into the "let me just straighten myself out a bit before I let You have me, Lord" category of human, you are either incredibly honest with God or incredibly dishonest with yourself.

How often has Jesus been my last resort in fixing my sorry self? Hold on, Lord. Just gimme a minute to rub this filthy paw all over my soul and scrub the cakes of sin off, and then I'm all yours. 

Caked with sin. Howsabout we toss the paw, the sponge, the chisel, and go straight for the sledgehammer because these sins are clinging on tight.


Oh, I really avoided my dirty world a lot today, Lord. That pit of immorality- bounded right over it, Lord! Those wretched words to slay my child's confidence- I didn't speak them, Lord! I did really well. So well. In fact, why don't You come back tomorrow and maybe I'll need You to clean me then.

I stay isolated in a back porch of my own design.

Instead of living in the room prepared for just that, living.

And if by some miracle, or serious self-delusion, I am able to maintain that I am in fact clean by my own efforts, it just takes a speck of dirt colliding with the Water of Life to make a mud I didn't even know I was creating. Jesus, He uses that mud to make the blind me see.

I had a friend clean my back porch last week. She kneeled on my floor and washed my spiritual feet when she erased those pitiful prints.

Talking about blinding to truly be seeing.

The white was tremendous. My eyes retreated at the reflection of light coming off the white that I had forgotten was even there.

I believe I find that in the Bible under the word dazzling...

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. ² And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, ³ but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. ⁴While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. -Luke 24

Those holy messengers with a message that dazzled love so deeply that even their apparel couldn't conceal it...

 

They came to confirm- No back porch needed. No self-service here. No rugs and mats to clean our dirty feet, but a Savior who kneels at these filthy calloused soles and this filthy calloused soul and washes us clean as we lay helpless and defeated.

Things have changed, and the brilliant robes of angels can't compare with the blinding robes of righteousness displayed on this wounded woman's heart.

Defeat isn't part of the equation. Battle's done. And you won. You're all sparkly clean and fresh and alive now. So get out of the back porch and getsta living.