This morning, as I was on a run, the Lord convicted me to pick up trash. I had seen the trash day in and day out and had just gotten used to it, but He told me to clean it up.
Okay, so let me just start by telling you a lot of times the Lord speaks to me through metaphors and I’m not even a poet… or maybe I am and just don’t know it.
For morning ministry, we were supposed to paint the house we are living in. There weren’t enough paintbrushes for all of us, so a teammate and I decided to pick up trash.
We cleared the path we walked on day in and day out. Never before have I noticed all the crap on the streets. Like I said earlier, I was just used to it.
As we were picking up trash, this one plastic bag got caught in some thorns. It was too difficult to get out, so we just left it.
A little later as I was walking the Lord showed me how metaphorically the trash was like the sin in my heart.
I walk day in and day out with the sin, so often times I don’t even notice it. And sometimes when I do try to clean up my heart, like the bag stuck in the thorns being too difficult, it is too difficult so I leave it.
As we were picking up more trash we bent down at the same time and place, she picked up one thing and I picked up the other. Both of us had noticed one piece of trash, but neither of us noticed both.
As I stood up, the Lord taught me how important community is. Living with people day in a day out, often others can see the little sin in our hearts that we can’t.
Picking up trash or sin, I could probably take care of most of the big stuff alone, but having someone helped me notice the small stuff that also made the street and my secret place (my heart) dirty.
