Clean Up Time

Happy Tuesday, My Friend!

Do you remember this annoying little ditty? “Clean up! Clean up! Everybody, everywhere! Clean up! Clean up! Everybody, do your share!” As far as I know, that originated with that big ol’ purple dinosaur, Barney. My apologies if you sing that for the rest of the day now.

When I was a kid, my mom made me help to clean the house every Saturday. She worked full-time, so housework was not accomplished during the week. One of my jobs was dusting the furniture. I was not allowed to merely sweep the room with a glance—no way! We’re talking full-on, a can of Pledge in one hand and an old t-shirt scrap in the other. Table surfaces were to be spotless, and I was not to neglect the carved legs of our fancy table, which had more nooks and crannies than I could count. Later, as a teenager, I had to go to an allergist to see why I couldn’t breathe through my nose like a normal human. I was pronounced allergic to just about everything —including house dust. “Hallelujah!” I cried out from exam room #3, “No more dusting for me!” However, my mom did not share in my revelry. She bought me a facemask and handed me back the Pledge and the old t-shirt. Oh well, I tried.

Cleaning is never anyone’s favorite activity. But darn if the end result isn’t so sweet! And for me, I’d much rather clean up someone else’s house. My own mess is so boring. I’ve cleaned it up a million times already.

When Maria finished her sophomore year of college, and I went to pick her up from the house she was living in in Savannah, she and her two housemates had pretty much cleaned up the house. Her boyfriend (now husband) lived about a block away. After we’d gotten things pretty much squared away at her place, we walked up the street to see how Jared and his housemate were doing with their cleanup. What we found was the stuff of a TV reality show.

Jared opened the door and looked totally dejected, like the subject of one of those “sad eyes” paintings. As we looked beyond him into the house, we knew why. It seems that his housemate packed up his own belongings and skedaddled on out, leaving Jared with any and all cleaning that needed to be done. Disaster area #1: the kitchen. There couldn’t have been a clean dish in all of the house. I had one thought: Let me at it! I procured some rubber gloves and some cleaning products and went to work. (Again, why do I think cleaning other peoples’ disgusting messes is better than my own?) It may have taken some time, but I had that kitchen sparkling!

Fast-forward to the present day. Once, while I was visiting Maria’s family in California, and we were sitting around the living room, she asked me, “Have you ever watched one of those videos of a guy cleaning a rug?”

What? Why on God’s green earth would anyone want to watch a video of a guy cleaning a rug? You mean that’s a ‘thing’?

She then put a video on her TV of that exact thing.

Holy Hot Water Extraction!! I was mesmerized!

I know it might sound completely crazy, but you can’t believe how satisfying it is to see this filthy, beyond disgusting rug become totally clean and restored! When he starts, it’s impossible to tell what color the rug is or what pattern it might have. But slowly, after several repetitions of scrubbing, rinsing, scraping, and vacuuming, you see a beautiful rug emerge, looking like it never had a speck of dirt on it in its lifetime. I sang to myself: Ah! sweet mystery of life, at last I’ve found thee Ah! I know at last the secret of it all, All the longing, seeking, striving, waiting, yearning, The burning hopes, the joy and idle tears that fall! (Thank you, Rida Johnson Young, for those immortal lyrics.)

Those videos pop up into my life and/or social media feed every now and then, and every now and then I’ll watch one. I think the attraction is seeing that something so dirty and unusable can become like new. The “Before” and “After” pictures are stunning.

Seeing this transformation made me think: Wouldn’t it be nice to have someone take one of those cleaning machines to me and scrub me up, body and soul, and make me “like new” again?

Oh yeah, hold on a sec—Somebody did.

You see, I have it on good authority that no “dirty rugs” get to live forever with God in heaven. You need to be sparkly clean there. I’m talking no dust in the nooks and crannies. Who can possibly be that clean? Well, only one Person ever was. And the part that boggles my mind is that He was willing to endure a horrible death just so He could trade His perfect cleanliness for my grimy, stained imperfection. Because no matter how hard we may try to get clean ourselves or measure how we look compared to other rugs around us, ain’t nobody able to clean themselves up enough on their own. “Mostly good” or “More clean than dirty” won’t cut it when we’re trying to explain to God why we should live in heaven. That’s a relief, actually. No one has to try so hard to be or look perfect or perfectly clean. Just ask Jesus to help you get that way, and He’ll do all the work. He already did the work. As good of a cleaner-upper as I regard myself to be, I sure can’t outclean Jesus.

Oh, I need vacuuming now and then—like, every day. What can I say? I’m a human being living in a troubled world. Dirt happens. I’m just grateful that Jesus is a Master at cleaning up, restoring, and making people “like new” again. And again. And again.

I hope that you have been power-washed, too, or if you haven’t, that you will look into this fantastic cleaning service that’s been offered to us! We receive the benefits, yet He paid the price! You can’t beat that deal!

Hoping you have a wonderful week!

Written with love – – – Patti XOXO

 “The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald,  the fifth onyx, the sixth ruby, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth turquoise, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst.  The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl. The great street of the city was of gold, as pure as transparent glass.”

Revelation 21:18-21

(What our living space will look like some day!)