Spring cleaning
A perfect heart
Psalms and it’s what really prompted our efforts to de-clutter.
I will walk within my house with a perfect heart. Psalms 101:2 KJV
Here’s the same verse from the New Living Translation:
I will lead a life of integrity
in my own home. Psalms 101:2 NLT
What an intriguing idea! To walk in my house with a perfect heart, to lead a life of integrity in my own home. That covers so many possibilities. No guilt, no shame, no emotional baggage, no procrastination of dealing with stuff, physical or mental.
Some people put on an appearance of having their lives all together when they are around others out in the world, at work, at church, at school, but at home, and in their hearts, their lives are a mess. Or maybe their houses are neat and tidy, but their hearts are full of negativity.
Lead a life of integrity in your home
To walk with a perfect heart, to lead a life of integrity in my home means, among other things, to be honest with myself about the stuff in my house, and in my heart.
What keeps us from getting rid of the clutter in our homes? What keeps us from taking the time to evaluate what we have and decide what to keep and what to get rid of, or what to give to others? Why do we carry around the mental and emotional baggage that weighs us down and needs to be disposed of? What keeps us from walking in our homes with a perfect heart?
We come up with so many reasons, some of them more legitimate than others, but behind almost all of them is some sort of fear, or we’re not loving ourselves. Then we create a façade of excuses to hide what’s at a deeper level in our thinking.
Here’s one of those metaphors that has always meant a lot to me. Jesus explains to his disciples that he is like a grape vine and they are like branches. God is the gardener who prunes and trims the vine so it will be more productive. The dead and unproductive branches are cut off and disposed of. (See John 15:1-6 below)
Jesus is talking about our relationship with him and how the Father maintains that relationship as a gardener prunes his grapevines.
But the metaphor also sheds light on how we can keep what is productive in our lives and get rid of what isn’t.
Let God do the pruning
Maybe that’s where some of the reluctance comes from, in not dealing with the stuff hidden away in our closets or buried in our hearts. We think we have to decide what to get rid of how to get rid of it.
When we can see that it’s God who actually removes the unfruitful things and thoughts from our lives, it’s a bit easier to let something go.
How does this passage about a gardener pruning branches apply to you and me cleaning our house, whether it’s our literal house or the secret storage chambers of our thinking?
Well, when was the last time you took an honest look at the fruitful and unfruitful activities in your life? When have you looked at the things in your home with the question: Does having this particular item in my home “bear fruit” so to speak, of the kind Jesus is talking about? Is it something that turns my thought toward God or pulls my heart away from God?
Is it something that helps you see and love yourself as worthy of God’s love, or is it something that reminds you of a time when you felt you were unworthy?
https://thebiblespeakstoyou.com/biblical-spring-cleaning/
