God in the Laundry

God has a way of revealing himself right in the most ordinary of circumstances. Tonight as I pulled another load of laundry from the dryer only to discover that a pen that was buried in the pocket of a pair of pants had exploded over all the clothes, I broke down and cried. As I sorted through the pile deciding what was worth staying up for tonight to scrub in my sleep-deprived state and what I would be willing to let go of (telling myself "they're just clothes"), I was overwhelmed by the thought that "I just don't want to lose anything else." Just a pile of ink stained clothes...but as I'm tossing out the clothes that couldn't possibly be salvaged suddenly the memories from a difficult season of loss came flooding back. We grieved those losses and we saw God's hand at work in the midst of difficulty working it all for His good, and, yet, if there's one thing that I've leaned about myself in losing is that it has a funny way of making me cling (sometimes with a death grip) to things that I don't want to let go of...some things that were never meant to have a place in my life. Fear. I have a way of justifying my fear of loss as being contentious or careful and trying to deceive myself into believing that sometimes my all-consuming fear is acceptable or respectable even. Control. As I work so hard to keep these neat and tidy spaces outwardly in my house or in my life, I achieve a false sense of security at best. And then a pen explodes in the pocket (of life) and permeates everything, and as I'm scrubbing thousands of little ink spots with a toothbrush that I could never possibly scrub clean completely, I recognize that all this striving that I've constantly been doing in my own strength, my own righteousness, is like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6)...like this mountain of clothes that I'm trying to conquer. This is the reason that Jesus came. And I can lay down the idol of neat and orderly that somehow gives me a feeling of control that's always fleeting (as if I could possibly know what's best anyway). And I can lay down my fears and insecurities and truly trust in the one that is in complete control and always working to refine and make me more like Jesus. And throughout the gains and losses of this life, I can declare with joy with my mouth and with my living:"Naked I came from my mother's womb, And naked I shall return there. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD." (Job 1:21) God is near...even in the laundry