Dirty White Walls
In reflecting on my life, I am reminded of getting haircuts with my father at the barber shop. It was an adventure which I shared with my dad. Sitting up on the board across the arms of the gigantic chair with a cape covering my body was an exciting experience. As the barber cut away, he would make small talk with me. He would ask me how I was and what I had been doing since the last time he cut my hair. One Saturday sitting there like a big man, he asked me about my week. I proudly told him that my father and I had washed our car. I told him how shiny and new all the chrome looked and how clean the inside was. The next thing I knew my daddy was totally shocked and embarrassed and the barber was laughing. I had mentioned scrubbing the tires and that I had never known that we had whitewall tires before. I did not understand the excitement over my comment until later when my father explained that I had shared with the barber just how long it had been since the car was last washed.
Allowing things to be so dirty for so long we become used to the dirt and think nothing of it. The dirt becomes normal, even natural. It becomes a part of our everyday life. Such is our flesh and its desires. When we allow our flesh the freedom to roam around in our life it will slowly hang out until it becomes normal and natural to us. We reach a point where we don’t see anything wrong with it and even defend it as ‘this is the way God made me’.
“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.” Galatians 5:16-17
That is why a daily, preferably at the start of each day, personal devotion time with Jesus and His Word is so important. We each need time to begin our day humbled by His Spirit. We need time to be transformed by His Word. We need time to thrash our flesh and crucify it before it takes up residency for the day.
“I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” Galatians 2:20
It is not easy, but Jesus desires this intimate time with each of His followers and will do whatever we allow Him to do to see that it happens. So let us be still and quiet and listen to His gentle voice and He will be exalted in our life.
“Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.” Psalm 46:10
Because Jesus loves us,
Bro. Hugh Folds
Matthew 6:33
