Small, seemingly insignificant tasks drive me nuts.
Make my bed?
Put my laundry away??
Clean my retainer???
I’m almost 21. You’d think I’d do these things by now. But, every time laundry day comes around or I hop out of bed, I’m greeted with these endless, futile tasks. And they seriously irk me.
I’m thoroughly irked.
But are they really futile?
Let’s take my retainer for a moment. I’ve been meaning to clean it with the solution for months upon months, but I only remember when it’s 11:00 and I’m grumpy and settling into bed (kind of like how I only remember I need a new razor or shampoo when I’m in the shower . . . not very helpful then).
So does it get done?
No.
And it hit me the other day when I finally got my lazy self out of bed and spent JUST FIVE MINUTES cleaning my dirty retainer.
We’re like this with sin.
—
We know it’s there: that idol. That inordinate desire. That guilty pleasure.
And yet we wonder why we feel so dirty. So far from God. Why we can’t conquer the sin.
We don’t take the five minutes to dedicate the problem to God. We refuse to acknowledge that there’s a problem (“What?? My retainer isn’t dirty!). We don’t scrub it with the power of His Word.
It was like a lightning bolt hit me as I slipped the retainer into my mouth. I’d figured it was past the point of no return; after all, it’s three years old. It’s bound to be dirty, right? Maybe this is just how retainers are. But man—it was so CLEAN. I was shocked . . . and more than willing to wear it every night again.
Likewise, why are we so stunned when, after casting our cares to God, we feel the burden lift off of our shoulders? Why do we, upon repenting of a sin, marvel at how we are more empowered to say no when temptation rolls around again?
It takes five minutes to clean a dirty retainer. It takes five seconds to repent and give something over that’s holding us back in life.
So . . . it’s time to clean your retainer.
