I can’t believe it’s almost Christmas. Wasn’t it just thanksgiving? Do you feel like this? I feel like I’ve been so busy keeping up with life that Christmas has blind-sided me. It actually reminds me a lot of the story of Jesus’ birth in the book of Luke.
There was so much going on in the world and people were dealing with a lot of things – oppression from the government, the hassle of a census, finding available hotel rooms, keeping track of family and friends, spending time at religious activities, following a celestial phenomenon in the night sky, or just keeping watch over their flocks. Meanwhile, God decides the timing is perfect to interrupt the already full storyline and throws the plot into a totally different direction. Some people were able to keep track of all the foreshadowing and saw it coming (Anna, Simeon, Magi). Others were caught completely off guard and were pretty freaked out by it (Shepherds, Joseph and Mary).
How has God invaded your story? Did you see it coming? I feel like my life has a lot of plot-related tension in it right now. I pray that in the week ahead, I can take a step back and refocus on the bigger picture and avoid getting so caught up in the details and distractions. I hope God has some plot twists in store for me, I could use a little change in the narrative.
I went this afternoon to put something in the shared fridge at Calvary we have in the video studio. It’s just a little black mini fridge. The odor that emanated from it was anything but mini.
I foolishly decided to figure out what in the fridge was giving off the stench. I pulled out the first, and most obvious, cause – a thing of hummus dip. It was about a month past its expiration and had a slight odor. I then went to the gorgonzola, walnut salad – a slightly stronger smell and equally past its prime sell-by date. The string cheese on the middle shelf expired back in October, but it didn’t smell due to the air tight packaging.
The real culprit I could now tell was on the bottom, on a shelf long ignored and forgotten. I picked up the small bottle of Naked Apple Juice,which expired in September, and even through its packaging could smell a funk slowly seeping through. The last item left in the fridge was an innocuous looking plastic bag. It was wrapped up around a block of some sort. I unwrapped the bag, opened it and almost died. There were slices of muenster cheese that had gone completely rancid. It was now a fuzzy black and white cheese that made my eyes instantly water and the entire room quickly filled with it’s essence. It was the kind of monstrous smell that knocks you backwards, collapses your lungs and gives you hallucinogenic visions. Seriously, it was that bad.
So, lessons learned…. First of all, the people I work with like some already stinky food. When it’s allowed to go months past its expiration date, it just becomes even stinkier. The other thing this made me think of is sin. It seems enticing at first. We let it into our fridge/hearts because we think we’ll like it. But, we let it fester and rot unchecked. Days, weeks, even months go by and we finally examine our lives only to find that it’s odor has escaped into every bit of our lives. It’s contaminated everything. The only thing we can do at that point is clean it all out and start fresh. I love David’s words in Psalm 57.
Purify me from my sins,and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
Oh, give me back my joy again;
you have broken me—
now let me rejoice.
Don’t keep looking at my sins.
Remove the stain of my guilt.
Create in me a clean heart, O God.
Renew a loyal spirit within me.
Do not banish me from your presence,
and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and make me willing to obey you.
