Lent traps

Have you ever had someone leave paper in their pants pocket and you didn’t realize it until after you washed them? Yeah….well, that is a NIGHTMARE. And I have had one of those this week. Someone in my family-all who seem to think it is someone else-left paper in their pocket and then I sent the pants through the wash. When I lifted the lid to the washer, I knew immediately that there was a problem because there were shreds of paper everywhere. I decided to try and wash the load a second time and then a third, trying to help get rid of some of the paper. After the third wash, I loaded the laundry into the dryer and purposed to pay close attention to the lent trap, thinking it would catch the rest of the paper. I cleaned the trap three times, pulling out wads of paper shreds and feeling pretty good about salvaging the laundry-that is until I realized I burnt up the dryer. (Praise the Lord, I didn’t burn the house down!) Somehow some of the lent got trapped in the tubing and wasn’t letting it vent properly, the result of which was that the dryer was working but not drying. What a mess. Laundry covered in paper, dryer not working and all because someone left something hidden in their pockets.
Isn’t that just like life? Because we don’t deal with what is on the inside, hidden, eventually there is a mess that comes to the surface. Perhaps, it is while we are trying to clean up or wash, that everything comes to light and shreds of what was hidden are laid out everywhere. Our intentions may have even been good-to get clean, but because we didn’t deal with what lies beneath, the coming out is a mess. And then when we try to clean it up, because it wasn’t dealt with properly, the heat is turned up and it burns out what we never intended to be broken. Somehow, we just figured it would all come out in the wash or the lent trap would catch it and it would be no big deal, but instead, a bigger mess is made and what was hidden is now revealed.
Perhaps life looks like my laundry. Shreds of sin that were hidden beneath the surface now apparent in the cleansing process because we chose to hide instead of deal. And in the meantime, when the heat was turned up, other things were broken as well. Could it be that we could have avoided the whole mess if we had just dealt with what was hidden within? A lent trap is not enough, we have to remove the sin that so easily entangles us and makes a mess. So quit hiding and empty your pockets-lay it all on the table and decide to come clean so that the washing is pure and not a bigger mess.

ALL FOR YOU