Every day for the past two weeks, my wife has traveled back and forth to the hospital 40 miles away to be with her mom in ICU. Needless to say, she ate a lot of fast-food. Not her normal but she left the back floor board running over with Hardee’s, Bojangles’, Taco Bell’s, and Burger King bags plus snack wrappers and drink cups from the QT gas station. The first night she was home before dark, I took her out for a good meal. When I sat down in the car I immediately blurted out, “What is that smell? It stinks!” She pointed to the back. Next morning I cleaned out all the trash for her. What a difference. For her, who likes to keep her car clean, circumstances lead to an accumulation of trash.
At times, our spiritual life can become cluttered from trash because of our circumstances. We live in a filthy world where junk and garbage can inadvertently pile up in our life. The makeup of our trash is not always from sinful failures. The Old Testament makes a clear distinction between sin and uncleanliness. The Law specified multiple actions and items that made a person unclean—food such as pork, catfish also childbirth, skin disease, or contact with a dead body, menstruation, and even normal sexual intercourse made a husband and wife unclean. The Law didn’t considered any of these sin; rather they made people ceremonially unclean unable to come before God. But the Law also provided rituals for cleansing. For Christians cleansing comes through Christ. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ . . . cleanse your conscience from dead works (Heb 9:13, 14). One example: being around sinful and vulgar people can leave unwanted trash in our minds. Letting it pile up, consciously or unconsciously, can make us feel unclean. If disregarded, it will make our life stink. We only need to ask God to cleanse us.
Removing trash requires a deliberate effort, whether physically or spiritually. I take out my office trash once a week. Ok, I admit, I don’t always succeed, leaving my floor littered with empty drink bottles. My wife insists the kitchen trash goes out every day. Trash left to pile up can bring danger because it produces clutter we can trip over, unwanted stench, brings roaches, flies, and mice that carry disease. Compare this to when we allow unclean issues to accumulate in our life. Numerous circumstances leave trash such as memories of hurtful words or relationships, worries and anxieties, unfulfilled expectations, rejection, self-pity, and shattered dreams. This list is endless. It will vary with every individual. This kind of trash will slow our spiritual growth and hinder our relationship with God.
A more subtle type of trash also exists that’s not unclean. I call it spiritual clutter. Clutter is defined as a lot of or too much stuff in a messy state, especially things that are not useful or necessary. The children have cluttered the floor with their toys. I always taught my students, “If the devil can’t stop you from doing something for God, he will tempt you to become so busy you won’t do anything effectively.” In other words, he clutters your life. The first step in decluttering your life is learning to let go and to say no. The worst offender of producing clutter can be the church. A philosophy that’s been around for decades is if you want something done, ask a busy person. Problem, this only further clutters the individual and usually after 18 months, they burn out. They need to recognize their clutter, let go, and say no. Leaders must understand this in order to have a healthy ministry team.
The second step for getting the clutter out of our life is acknowledging you need to take out your trash. Like physical trash, this requires a deliberate effort on your part. Admit you have issues that are cluttering you. Trash and clutter develop from bad relationships, memories, worry, emotional baggage, work, ministries, unnecessary thoughts etc. The majority of clutter happens in our thoughts. Studies show we have 60,000 thoughts a day, but 75% of them are the same thoughts we have day after day. Paul wrote, one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead (Phil 3:13). He decluttered and moved on. In the next chapter, he gives a solution for the 75% we rehash every day. Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things (Phil 4:8). Change what you think about by renewing your mind.
You may need to declutter your relationships. Some people bring nothing but clutter and trash. Don’t let their clutter bring you down. Put aside frustration and worry. Rid yourself of unnecessary distractions that drag you into your past. That’s history, which you can’t change. Make your own list of what clutters and fills you with trash. It will soon be time for spring-cleaning. Include in your physical cleaning a spiritual cleaning.
Sustaining Word for the Week: Does something stink in your life? Do you feel cluttered? Then it’s time to take out the trash