I’ve heard it said that trying to keep your house clean when you have young children is like trying to brush your teeth while eating Oreos.
I’ve also heard it likened to trying to shovel your driveway while it’s still snowing.
I can identify with both of these. I’ve never exactly kept an immaculate house (well, until I began nesting while pregnant with my first child), but I’ve gotten a lot better in recent years. At least, I think I have. It’s hard to tell when the house is so often a wreck.
Do I just need to try harder? Do I need to be better and more diligent at teaching my kids to clean up after themselves? Is keeping a clean house while I have young children even possible, anyway?? (If you have five children ages 11 and under, and you are a stay-at-home mom, and you homeschool, and you keep your house neat and clean on a regular basis with no outside help, then by all means, let me know how you do it! Seriously!)
But as nice as it would be to have a clean house often enough that, when we are cleaning, my kids don’t ask, “Is someone coming over?”, it would be even nicer (and even more important) to have a clean spiritual “house.”
Just as there are things that clutter up our physical houses, so there are things that clutter up our spiritual houses. Not Legos and artwork and stuffed animals, but slander and obscene talk and deceit. We’re commanded to get rid of such things as these (see Eph. 4:31, Col. 3:8, and 1 Peter 2:1), but too often, we leave them lying around where they’re bound to get in the way again.
Getting rid of the clutter in your house is great, but you also want to make sure there’s no dirt coating the kitchen sink, the toilet, or the floors. If you’re going to clean your spiritual house, you need not only to declutter it, but to remove the filth (sin) that clings to it. While it is true that Jesus cleansed us from all our sins when He died on the cross for us, and that His perfectly righteous life stands in the place of our sinful one, it’s also true that we still sin on a pretty regular basis. We need to be quick to confess our sins and receive the forgiveness and cleansing God has promised us (see 1 John 1:9), not leave the filth lying around.
We also need to keep our physical houses aired out. If you’ve ever owned a vacation home (yeah, I haven’t either), or been to one that hasn’t been used in awhile, you know that even a clean home can begin to smell musty when it hasn’t been used for a long time. The only thing you can do is open doors or windows to get fresh air circulating. To put that in terms of our spiritual house, we need to be receiving a regular influx of the Holy Spirit’s ministry to us. He is the One who refreshes us spiritually. He lives in the heart of each mom who has acknowledged Jesus as her Lord, but it’s a whole lot easier for Him to minister to us when we are putting ourselves in a position to hear from Him. Are we neglecting Bible reading, prayer, or corporate worship? No wonder our spiritual house smells musty!
It’s not easy to keep our physical houses clean. In fact, it’s really hard. I would love to have a maid to help me.
It’s not easy to keep our spiritual houses clean, either. It’s sometimes really hard not to sin, or to do the things we know we should do. But even better than having a maid to help us keep our physical house clean, we have God Himself to help us keep our spiritual house clean. He’ll show us what needs to get tossed out and what we need to start doing. And then He’ll give us the strength and wisdom to do it.
But we have to be willing to take action. If we had enough money, we could hire a maid (or a whole team of maids) to clean our physical house while we sat around and did nothing. But God doesn’t work like that. He’s not going to bestow a clean spiritual house upon us while we just continue dirtying it up or sit around not caring that it’s dirty. We have to cooperate by doing what He shows us to do—or not do.
Are you ready and willing to clean your spiritual house?
Ask Him to show you where and how to get started.
Psalm 139:23-24—Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting! (ESV)