Liquid Draino This Instant!

Liquid Draino This Instant!

I don’t know how people live without a garbage disposal. It is one of the simplest, most user-friendly, slim-to-no maintenance required, relatively cheap kitchen appliances out there. And it does SO much! The benefits are staggering…a bunch of smelly, undesirable food parts—gone!—at the flick of a switch. Less trash to take out. A fresh scent to fill the kitchen (if oranges are your peel of choice). Water freely flowing through the kitchen sink once again. Ah, America. Only you would think of a way to improve upon waste disposal (or was it China? Everything’s made in China. Anyway, smart people).

A garbage disposal is one of the first things I had installed in my townhouse, and I use it every day. But I’ve recently discovered another kind of pipe that could use a similar device from time to time: my emotional pipes.

Ever noticed how some people are as transparent as a missing window pane? They cry at the drop of a hat, they shout with joy and laugh out loud (and I do mean LOUD), and you can read their every emotion because it’s written all over their faces. Ah, I envy them. Their emotional pipes are pretty darn clean.

But me? Mine get clogged up. As much as I try to maintain my pipes by appropriately expressing my feelings, I'm also known to stuff them down, or try to wish them away. I invalidate them, or ignore them altogether. Then, when I least expect it, I’m suddenly “clogged up,” or down and out for “no reason,” or I snap at the radio (I live by myself, so that’s my company).

“What’s going on?” I wonder. Simple: I've got an emotional clog. I haven’t dealt with something that needs my attention.

These pipes take maintenance! While I certainly try my best to keep them clean and clear, I also need God to use His Liquid Draino every once in awhile. To flick on His garbage disposal. To clear me out. Only then can I be usable by Him again.

Is something hindering the Holy Spirit's flow in and through you? Have you checked your pipes? Do you have a dreaded hairball of sin or lingering negativity that can only be dissolved by God’s Liquid Draino?

"Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."
Psalm 139: 23-24 (Jodi version: “See if there is anything stopping me up from being usable by you, and use Your Liquid Draino so Your life can flow freely through me once again.”)

“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.”
1 Corinthians 6: 19-20 (Jodi addition: “…and keep your pipes clean for His sake.”)