Running My Race with My Ragamuffin Cleaner

Well it’s been quite a while since I wrote on my blog. I’m kind of changing it and updating it a bit to reflect the current path of the race called “my life.” I hope you are encouraged and challenged through the words that the Pen Master gives me. (Shout-out to my little sis, Michele, for that term!) What better week to begin again than with this week serving with my church’s mission project called Love Atlanta. This was a week that my church partnered with several charitable organizations to “love Atlanta.” There were tons of opportunities to clean, paint, sort books, garden, feed, love on, work with kids, listen and be a friend to the homeless, brokenhearted, needy and oppressed. My husband and I chose three very different projects. I will be blogging about each one in the coming days and how the Lord showed me something special in all of them.

Cleaning a homeless shelter for young adults was the first project we did. There were about six of us working in this shelter. It was not the most glamorous work, but it was a needed task to be done. We went into their living quarters and swept, mopped, dusted, vacuumed and cleaned their bathrooms. There were about 10 rooms we cleaned plus two living/recreational areas. I mainly worked on cleaning the bathrooms. God humbled me years ago and told me, if all he wanted me to do was clean toilets, then I should do it to the best of my ability and for his glory. So I did this week. Now granted, it’s not my favorite cleaning job… (As if any cleaning is?); but I am pretty good at getting a toilet spotless and shiny. I have a family with 3 boys and a husband, so I am picky about toilets being cleaned—and the seats being put down as well! So I cleaned for the good of the homeless young adults, and for the glory of God. I scrubbed the showers as well. Let me just tell you something: mildew comes straight from the devil himself! I do not know what the purpose of that organism is. I’m sure there is one—decomposition or something—but it does not belong on the inside of a home. I scrubbed with a disinfectant and a little scrubby pad I had—to no avail. These mildew stains had been there awhile. The longer they had been there, the larger they spread and the harder it was to clean them. So I had to get the big guns out… a spray bottle with bleach. It certainly worked better, but not like I would have liked. There were still stains left behind, probably permanent, that would need to be painted or grouted over. We worked for three straight hours and I tried to get all the toilets and showers clean, (other workers did the sinks, mirrors and floors) but they weren’t as white and shiny as I would have preferred. I wanted the kids to come to their rooms and be blown away by how clean and shiny everything was. Just to be clear, we made a HUGE difference, but I wanted to do so much more. But alas, we had to come to a stopping point because of time.

There is a lesson to be learned from this. Maybe a few different ones. We come to the Father and he washes us and bleaches us totally clean—no doubt about that at all. But being in the world we live in, with the skin called our flesh, we get stains on us from sin—the mildew of our lives. (I told you where it came from!) The longer we let it go unattended, the more it can grow and leave permanent marks on us. Now, I know that Jesus’ blood takes away our sin; he did that way before we ever even committed the first one. But the consequences can definitely leave us with marks, scars or even a limp as we run our race toward The Prize. We should attend to each mildew stain as soon as we can. Not by cleaning it up by ourselves, as I have tried so often to do; but by showing God our dirt, (he sees it already) and asking him to “bleach” us clean with his blood. The longer we wait, the more ashamed we are to show him. Have you ever been ashamed to have a visitor see your house or especially your bathroom because it hasn’t been cleaned recently? I can think of a few times myself. But the reality is, our God is one of those visitors, who isn’t really a “visitor.” He’s family. He’s our Father. And he doesn’t care how dirty we are. He’s still willing to fellowship with us and even clean us up, if we allow Him. If we wait a while, although he still makes us as beautiful and clean as new, WE see the stains left behind. Sometimes they’re left on those we love too. Oh, those are hard to look at, to be sure. We need to seek forgiveness from them and then for ourselves as well. But the stains left behind, just might be a reminder to not go there again. The scars we are left with or the limp we walk with, might be a token left behind of the forgiveness we’ve received, the pain he has healed, or a heart he has broken in order to be put back together by the real Healer. The true Cleaner of our lives.

I currently run my race with a limp. I have battle scars and stains. It’s okay. They serve me well and I am ever so grateful I can still be used by Jesus for the purpose which he has called me. And fortunately, he is still working on me. No time limit on his scrubbing. It’s not very pleasant at times, but he does it oh so gently, with so much love and grace. After all, he is my Abba and I’m his ragamuffin daughter, who he has begun a good work in—and rest assured he will complete me—in his time.

Thank you my Abba, for cleaning me white as snow. And even though I am left with some scars, stains, and even limps from my own doing, you are able to use those in your greater purpose for me, for others and even for your splendor. Only you can do that. Give me strength to carry-on my race with endurance, fixing my eyes upon you, my Prize, the Author and Finisher of my faith. Oh how I long to see you at the finish line!

Love, Your ragamuffin runner.