A Layne Post
My stomach turned, my lip curled. It was involuntary, but guilt washed over me like a flood. I felt unloving. I took a big breath through my mouth, careful not to let air in through my nose. I poured lots of detergent and carefully poured the clothes into the washer making sure nothing touched my hands.
Bandages
Wounds stink. It isn’t something someone can control. Baths don’t help. It comes with advanced cancer, cancer like many have probably never seen. We change and clean bandages. But the fact is we don’t have access to nice charcoal bandages that can help with the stench; they are expensive and not practical. And so we have learned to breathe through our mouths, and when the person is near, we are careful to control our facial muscles, willing them to stay steady and not move, in an effort to honor the person and discredit the wound, in an effort to love.
The washing machine played its little chime from the veranda. The laundry was done.
I carefully lifted a shirt and with trepidation I sniffed. The smell was gone, washed away by streams of cleansing water. Into the dryer they went. An hour later I pulled clean fresh clothes out, carefully folded them and walk out back.
Gratefulness. I was greeted by a man physically suffering beyond what most of us will ever know. He with all humility, not weakness mind you, but humility, offered thanks for my small gesture.
Sometimes loving comes easy. But then there are other times that loving is a choice. Sometimes it is a matter of taking a deep breath, moving forward and serving, even when everything in your body tells you to back up.
I wonder if the Lord felt the same way. Our sins like gaping cancerous wounds attached to our bodies destined to die. Perhaps His lip curled as He took a deep breath through His mouth and stepped towards us, being birthed onto this earth, choosing to move forward in deep love, honoring the persons and not the wounds. And then as the blood of Christ fell like a flood spilt upon the ground, our stench was washed away.
Will we, too, respond in humble gratefulness, aware of the stench our sins put off? Have we been washed in the blood? Maybe, though our bodies were born with stench of our sin, we can offer incense and be called His?
He stepped toward us. He chose love.