Cleaning Out The Garage

"Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth; fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry." -Colossians 3:5

In the summer I spend a lot of time working on my lawn, how my home looks means a lot to me because it is a reflection of who I am and how I live. My grandmother would always say that if the outside of your home is a mess people will automatically assume that the inside is the same.

I came across an article in which a gentleman was talking about his garage and how cluttered it was, he went on to say that the garage was such a mess that he always had to park his car in the driveway because there was no room for it inside. His neighbors would open their garage doors up in the summer showing off how organized they were but he was embarrassed to do so.

A lot of our lives are filed with clutter, we try to keep a clean well groomed appearance on the outside but the inside there is so much mess that there is no room for Jesus. We spend so much time and money on material things that beautifies the outer part, that we forget about cleaning up the inside. The Pharisees were the same way and Jesus called them blind, they were more concerned with their outer appearance and the laws they had in place rather than being concerned with what was on the inside of them which was full of extortion and self-indulgence, Jesus said to them, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also "Matthew 23."

When you are indulging in things like pornography and watching movies that fill your mind with cursing., when you go through the day with so much hate and un-forgiveness in your heart towards others, when you are trying to do Gods job by judging others, you are then hoarding and filling up the garage and keeping Jesus in the driveway.

"The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness" Matthew 6:22,23 (NKJV).

The one thing I hear so much is that famous phrase "I'm an adult and mature enough to handle what I watch without it corrupting my mind" but the truth is, that is what the devil wants you to think. Everything that we see, read, and hear is stored into our minds and if we continue allowing things that are impure inside taking up space that belongs to God, it will become overflowing and start to spill out and others will soon see what is behind the closed doors. The things that you place in your mind will control your thoughts and lead to sin. If you lust for another woman because you indulge in porn, your thoughts will soon lead to adultery so that your fantasy can be fulfilled. The same goes for drugs, alcohol, and video games. Where your thoughts are your heart will be, and your actions will follow.

If you look, read, and listen to things that are clean your mind will become clean, with a clean mind comes a clean heart, and out of a clean heart comes a clean exterior for everyone to see. Bible scholar W.E. Vine said that the Greek word for clean means "free from impure admixture, without blemish, spotless." A pure heart is the work of Jesus Christ and only in His power can we remain clean.

David let his lust for another mans wife get the best of them, his mind and eyes were set on Bathsheba as he watched her through the his window. The thoughts of David was impure because Bathsheba was the wife of Uriah, David's thought drew in his heart, and soon his actions followed and lead to David sinning against God. In Psalm 101 David declares his purpose and ask for God's help in maintaining righteousness. David said "I will set nothing wicked before my eyes, I hate the work of those who fall away, it shall not cling to me, A perverse heart shall depart from me, I will not know wickedness". David knew that to have a clean heart we had to have a clean mind, If we look at what was impure our hearts would become impure.

There is a gospel song I enjoy listening to called "Clean Up What I Messed Up" a verse from the song says "I'm going to cleanup what I messed up, going to start my life all over again," I've had to do some cleaning up of my life, my mind was so corrupted at one time that I had no room for Christ. Just like the verse from the song I started cleaning up the mess that I had made of my life and I had to start with what I was feeding into my mind.

We have to first clean up what is on the inside because that which in the heart is who we truly are. Being in the world we have to deal with a certain amount of profanity from those around us, If we want to make an impact and bring others into the kingdom, we must first be among them. Being among the world does not mean that we have to be conformed to it, we can sit with sinners but we do not have to follow their ways when we think no one is looking. If we want to make room for Jesus then we need to clean up what we have messed up, we must clean up our hearts and stop parking Jesus in the driveway, it's time to have a garage sale and clean out the clutter.

Cleaning Out The Garage - Making Room For Jesus is written by French Miller / Called2Blessing Ministries, Please visit http://www.called2blessingministries.org