Never Enough

My house never seems clean enough for me. I grew up in a house that was always full of love, there might have been a pile here and there, but it always looked nice for guests and it was always pretty organized and clean. But more important than that, it was full of love. If the walls could talk on 1679, they would have stories to tell about a family growing up.

So, why is that in recent years I have become like Monica? My house is never clean enough, never organized enough to suit me. I know that some of it is my need to control. There isn't much that I can control in this world: I can't guarantee my safety, my income, what friends and family will do. I can't control the control, or to some extent my emotions. But I can control how my house looks. So, I do. I clean and organize and rearrange, constantly. Partly I do enjoy the labor- because it pretty immediate gratification. It doesn't take that long to go from a floor that needs to be swept, to a floor that is swept and mopped and shines.

Yet, there is always something else to do. Once I finish dusting, there is probably dust where I first started. Once I finish vacuuming, my cat has probably left some hair somewhere. Yet, I do it. Because when I have people over I want to have a clean house. I want it to appear that I'm an organized, clean person.

Isn't that a metaphor for the Christian life? No matter how often we clean up our lives, there is still some growth left, some other sin in our lives. No matter how much we scrub ourselves, we still are not clean enough to get into Heaven. Our cleanest is still filthy compared to God. It is never enough. We can't DO anything to please Him.

Yet, we don't have to. That is the amazing thing about God. He sees us, filth and all and says "I love you." He wants the memories with us- not the cleanliness. Our relationship with Him is not about how clean we are before Him, because we aren't. It is about being with Him. Just being. That is such a comfort.

Yet, we try to clean up our lives. Not because we have to, for no work we do will earn us Heaven, but because it is a sign of respect and love. Just like I clean my house so that my friends and family can be more relaxed and comfortable, and as an act of love. I clean up my life and try to keep it clean out of love and respect for God.

Even now as I think upon the memories I have in this townhouse, they not memories of where my couch was (it has been in so many places, who can remember!?!) but of what I was doing and the people I was with, or the talks I had with Christ.

I will probably keep on being supra organized, needing to control that aspect of my life, that will never change. I just hope as I'm doing it I'm making sure that my life is cleaner and more organized than my house.

Oh, and I should probably learn to curb the rearranging habit before I get married...!

Yours,
JLK/PRT