The unknown filter in my washer featured a couple of posts ago got me thinking about faith and the things that we try to wash through it.
Our faith washer is used to make sense of our lives, to straighten things out, make them clean and wearable. We bring to it our load smelly and stinky and let faith wash us clean rinsing away all the junk we accumulated living life and following our own will.
Unfortunately, we often throw things into the machine that really should be tossed out. Of course the obvious red crayon makes a mess, but we recognize that and learn our lesson right away. But what about the smaller things, less colorful and noticeable? We assume that since those things seem to have come out clean with our laundry or were rinsed away easily enough it is okay to keep them in our pockets. Since the machine seemed to handle it we become lax in our sorting and more and more junk is thrown in the load and yet we still expect our laundry to come out clean.
What we don’t always understand is that there is a filter in the machine that is collecting the junk and after time those little things we assumed were washing away or coming out clean build up and our washers start to show evidence of the clogging effect even if we fail to recognize the association.
We notice the machine seems to be taking longer to give us what we want (clean soul laundry) and when the cycle completes the clothes just don’t look, feel, or smell as clean as we once remember. We become dissatisfied. We start to question the effectiveness of the machine in handling our load.
Eventually the machine finally can no longer function properly with all the junk we unknowingly built up in the internal filter. We now have several options.
1- Trash it: We can throw the machine out deciding it is pointless and we must have incorrectly remembered it as once working for us. We are then covered in our own filth but figure it is what life dealt us so we settle on a dirty life. At first we are even happy for it seems to lighten our load with nothing to have to wash anymore. We are indignant when it is suggested we may feel better if we tried using a machine again and accuse the washer user of unfairly judging us. After all we did give the washer a try it just didn’t work for us. Of course we need a new crowd to hang out with, other non washer users, this way we don’t have to notice how dirty we actually are becoming. This life wrought with disease eventually will destroy us.
2- Replace it: We can replace it. We seek out other washer replacers who support us as they too are wanting a new machine. We are thrilled with the capabilities of the new machine and convince ourselves our old one never worked this well. Since we don’t understand why the other machine stopped working and we still have the same laundry habits this new machine eventually doesn’t work for us either. From machine to machine we go never really understanding why none of them work well for us or last. We think we understand all about the machine for having tried it, but we really don’t know all the cool features or how the machine runs because we never open it up, we never studied it before moving on to the next one. We may even eventually opt for number one, trash it.
3- Seek Solutions -Read the owner’s manual, research and/or call an expert: The Bible manual may provide the answer as it explains about filters and what is acceptable to bring to the machine. Research may explain troubling aspects of the manual or give relatable examples of the problem to help us more clearly understand. If we struggle with the interpretation of the manual, and can’t seem to find clarity with research, we may call in help.
If competant and if we give them full access to our machine and enough time the expert will point out the truth filter, explain its importance, and show us how to properly maintain the machine and clean the filter so that it continues to work well. We may even learn unrelated things like what detergent works best in our machine cleaning our laundry even better then before the filter clogged.
Caution: Some self proclaimed experts may lead us astray and tell us it is a lost cause, replace it; or worse may have an agenda of their own and charge us more then we can afford for the repair. A second opinion won’t hurt unless we are really only searching for an excuse to do what we feel like trying; either option 1 or 2, so as to not have to put forth effort in the reading, research or maintenance work necessary in option 3.
Reminder: If our washer is slowing down, not cleaning as well as we would like, or has just quit working for us, we should look deep into the machine. We may find a filter of truth catching those little habits, thoughts, baggage, sins,… that just don’t wash and need to be cleaned out and diligently sorted out of our life permanently to keep our faith running smooth and our laundry clean.
Warranty: A misinterpretation of the manual or an incompetent expert may cause further damage to the machine, if this happens it isn’t too late to call the ultimate repair man, the author of the manual, the creator of all machines to help us get things fixed and washing well. No job to big or small. All parts covered.
Guarantee: If we chose option one or two and regret it that same repair guy
will deep clean us if needed, teach us how the machine is built and set us up with our original machine now restored. We may even become repairmen ourselves. No limitations and but the guarantee expires upon death.
Rebate: The analogy works for marriage too.