WHAT STINKS IN HERE????

     It had been "one of those days" for 2 days now. My Prince was gone and frankly, the kids were bored with me and I was tired of them. All in the last two days, the little boys got a hold of the coffee             grounds as I was brewing coffee and emptied the bag all over the counter. Someone left the freezer cracked  and the food defrosted. Jeremiah forgot to take the trash to the trash bin and something fury and alive strung  our nasty trash from one end of the deck and yard to the other. (I'm certain the neighbors were lovin' that!)    I was determined to put a dent in the laundry and ended up washing multiple loads of water. Water!!??!!       I  mean, who does that?  Jud decided to change his own dirty diaper during nap time--Praise God for            Lysol. And, to top it off, I thought I'd be smart and make dinner in advance. As five o'clock approached, I    slid  the  poppy seed chicken in the oven and went on to bath dirty little people. Our house began to fill with  the strange aroma of melting plastic and yummy food. Ooops, looks like I forgot to remove the saran            wrap before baking.                                                                                                                                    
    And that was only yesterday. Today held more excitement. More meltdowns that I could count from the 3 year old (I especially love the ones in Target or Pulix when no "bye bye" buggies are available.) I found         
 multiple messes from the baby-- I caught him in the office pulling files out of the filing cabinet....papers are    everywhere. Next, he unrolled a roll of toilet paper and played in the potty. Nice. By 5, I asked                    everyone what they wanted for dinner and loaded us up to head to multiple drive-thru destinations. To           appease each individual desire,  you may ask?  OH NO. To kill time until bed! ha! (Just a little mom trick).  Supper was consumed, baths were taken, homework completed, kitchen cleaned and we headed up for our nightly ritual of prayers, rocking and singing. The smell hit us at the top of the stairs.  WHAT STINKS IN      HERE??? It didn't take long to find out. To spare the gory details, someone allegedly, undeniably pooped in the tub. The water drained, the poop did not and it was revolting. No one 'fessed up. By process of               elimination, it wasn't hard to figure out who was guilty. What made me sad was that the guilty went to           desperate measures to cover her accident. I begged for her to just tell the truth, she wasn't in trouble....we all have accidents...don't cry. Nothing moved her. The more I talked the louder she denied it and her guilt was   blatant. Only more obvious than her guilt, was her attempt to cover it. Her denial hit a crescendo with            streams of tears. Why in the world would she not entrust the truth of the matter to me? She knew that I         knew.  Shame, guilt, embarrassment, fear, sorrow consumed her. She was a mess. And so was her poop   littering the tub! It hit me like a ton of bricks. In those big eyes pooling with tears and desperation, I saw an    image of my own self clearer than any mirror reflection I'd ever seen. God the Father whispered to me:        
     "The filth in that tub you are about to scrub is far more tame than any sin of yours and doesn't wreak half as bad. Your sin, your pride, your idols are worse that the excrement lying before you. And just as your       mother-heart breaks not for the mess, but for the pain you see as your daughter makes a maddening attempt to deny what is undeniable;  so My heart breaks when I watch you scramble to hide your sin, your shame,     your embarrassment. As you long to comfort and redeem her mess, I long to do the same with you...but      even more so.  In moments, you will humbly kneel down and scrub the foul and repulsive with bleach. But in my great love, I sent My Son to wash you. And in humility, He bowed low and did the unthinkable...with His blood you were scrubbed as white as snow."                                                                                               

Her resistance finally fell and she crumbled in my arms. I held her, comforted her and pinkie promised not to ever tell her secret. Her arms squeezed me tight and I and left her to slumber with my own heart full of much appreciation for the reminder of grace tonight. Paul Miller so eloquently states "...the very thing we avoid [exposing] like the plague-our weakness and our sin- is the door to grace in our lives."                     

Father, remind me of this. Speak your truth into my life afresh each day. Give me the courage not to conceal my junk out fear and shame, but to shine your light of grace in my darkness and grant me the grace to dare to live authentically in You. Thanks for the stink in the tub tonight...                                                                   

Heather