I’m hoping most of you recognize this image, a clothes line. Some have probably never used one, however, it used to be one of my favorite places.
When Dave and I first started studying, really studying the Bible, we lived in a rental house that accomodated our family quite well. It had everything we needed except a dryer. I would sit at the kitchen table and read my Bible diligently. We were actually doing a word study at the time – faith, peace, love, wisdom, Holy Spirit, etc. We would look each word up in a concordance, write down each reference location and then look them up in our Bibles.
We wanted to know what faith really was, how we received it, how it was to control our lives, how to walk by faith…the same was true for all the other words I listed above.
During this study was when I learned to love doing laundry and it was something I did frequently for a working husband and two small children. It seemed the only time I really had to myself was when the clothes finished washing and were ready to be hung on the line. The smell of freshly laundered sheets and towels and the warm sunshine gave me a sense of God’s presence and peace. The clothes line became my chapel.
It was there, I was alone with my thoughts and the things I had read in the Bible that day would flood my mind and my heart. It was there the Holy Spirit showed me how to apply those verses to my life.
The Bible became practical for the first time in my life. The clothes line was my personal Bible School and the Holy Spirit was my instructor. For the first time, I realized that not only had my sins been forgiven but they had been completely removed from the list of accusations against me. God, the Father Himself, had chosen to forget them completely.
I was clean and spotless in His sight.
“God himself was pleased to live fully in his Son. 20 And God was pleased for him to make peace by sacrificing his blood on the cross, so that all beings in heaven and on earth would be brought back to God.
21 You used to be far from God. Your thoughts made you his enemies, and you did evil things. 22 But his Son became a human and died. So God made peace with you, and now he lets you stand in his presence as people who are holy and faultless and innocent.” Colossians 1:19-22 CEV
I am faultless and innocent!
Cleansed, just like those sheets I hung on the line. My sins have been removed, no spots left. I had tried for years to atone for big mistakes and I had gotten no where. The guilt plagued me. However, when I read verses like the ones above I came to understand just how amazing God’s grace and how wonderful His love was!
The Father made peace with me because of what Jesus did and I can stand in His presence washed clean and spotless. In His presence I find help for every situation I encounter. You can too!
You have been made holy, faultless and innocent through Jesus’ sacrifice. Let the world see that you are clean and spotless basking in the light of the Son!