A Space for Grace

Have you noticed how size can seem relative?

When the kids are loud and running through the house, my house feels small. But when the house needs cleaning, it feels big. Really big. Too big for me to handle on my own. Sometimes, when I look around at our mess, the scale of it overwhelms me.

Yet the older my kids get, the more I realize I’m not in it alone. I don’t have to tackle the whole mess by myself. I can break it up into smaller sections and assign everyone a part. As the Mom, I can delegate and hand out mops, buckets, rags, and cleaners to my people and put them to work.

And, because I am the one in authority over them, I could choose to sit down in a comfy chair with a good book and get cozy. I could engross myself in a story and look up only now and then to make sure they are on task and doing what they’ve been told to do: Clean up the house I’ve provided.

I could. But not only does that seem like poor parenting, it’s not really fair, is it? Because, like them, I’ve contributed to the mess. That means I should get involved in the cleaning project alongside them.

But there’s another reason I couldn’t take that approach. They are my people. Messed up, sometimes hard to live with, but definitely harder to live without. This is my house. These are my people. My heart is all wrapped up in the cleaning project so I pick up a rag and a bucket and I get to work.

I could keep my hands clean and delegate.

But love compels me to step in and get involved.

Globalization, the internet, social media – all of it can make our world seem small. It can feel like there are a lot unruly children running around being loud, obnoxious, and just downright ill-behaved. Yes, sometimes the world feels small.

But if you look at the mess we’re all making, the world can seem big. Too big for us to handle on our own. It can feel discouraging when the people who live with us sit on the couch and delegate instead of stepping in to help, or when they’re just messing around rather than cleaning up.

The mess is big – but hear this: We are not alone in it.

This home, it is God’s house.

If this is His house, it is ultimately His responsibility. That doesn’t mean we lay back on the couch with a ‘not my house not my problem’ kind of attitude. We live here. We need to pick up a rag and get busy doing our part.

Not only is this His house,

these people, they are His people.

The world is a bit (a lot) of a mess. It’s a big cleaning project. And here’s the thing, this mess we’re in, it’s our mess. We made it. All of it. God could have stayed out of the mess. He could have handed off mops and buckets while remaining distant and aloof. He could have kept His hands clean.

But

His house.

His people.

His heart is all wrapped up in the cleaning project.

Love led Him into the mess.

At the center of the cleaning project is a little baby. 

And thus we find that our journey through the Psalms has led us to Jesus.

 

First posted at http://www.unshakenministries.com