When I was a little girl, my mom would declare a cleaning day to which my siblings and I would spend hours cleaning the house. Usually it meant someone was coming over and everything needed to be ready. One of the things I remember about those days is my mom saying, after I had announced my room to be clean, ”Ok Wendy, I want you to go back into that room and look again with fresh eyes to see if you’ve missed anything.” I would do so, come back out, and announce, ”Job finished.” My mom would then walk into the room and start pointing out the things I missed..dirt on the floor, a cup on the dresser (wait..that cup wasn’t there 2 minutes ago!) the bedspread is crooked, there’s a shoe by the closet, you need to open your curtains, clean the window, fold that blanket in your chair and put it away. Oh, I used to hate it when she would do that! Inwardly I thought, ”She always picks out the things I miss! She never just says ‘Good Job’ It’s never good enough!”
You see, my definition of a clean room meant having items picked up off the floor and making my bed. My mom’s definition was different. I wanted my definition, but her’s was the one required before I was allowed to say I was done
This action of coming in and pointing out all the areas I missed happened so many times that I began to do this thing when I thought I was done..I would walk out of the room and then walk back in pretending I was my mom (my mom who, I thought, loved to see every mistake). I would imagine myself to be her, looking with her eyes, so that when she came in a little later she would have nothing to say. Then, with a little bit of an attitude, I would announce, “Done!” She would then come in and, oh my goodness...dust? Dust on the dressers?! And now you want me to organize the clothes in my drawers? You can’t even see the clothes in my drawers?! What does it matter?? “It matters to me,” she would say, “And I’m your mother that has asked you to do it. You’ll be done when I say you are done.” Rant and inwardly rave all I wanted, she was right, I wouldn’t be done until it met her requirements.
So I would focused even harder to see the things I normally would overlook...to do the things I would think, “I bet she’ll say something about that” At age 12, my motivation and attitude weren’t right...she saw it and would even say, “Wendy, clean this room as if Jesus were going to walk in and look at it” to which I would inwardly roll my eyes because I thought my definition good enough.
As I look back on those days, I‘ve come to realize that a much bigger lesson was being learned than just having a clean room. I learned a little something about myself. I have a heart that, while it automatically thinks it knows and sees everything, it does not. Realizing this, I’ve come to understand that the only way I can see the things I miss is by putting on fresh eyes.
Our Christian life is very much like that room. Going into it, we have a definition of what we think it should look like, so we do the things we think are expected, things we think make for a clean room, a holy life. Where do we get that definition? Through the word of God that we read everyday? Or every other day? Or once in a while? Maybe our definition of a believer comes from what we hear on Sunday morning or through that new Christian self help book. And what about our thoughts of who God is? His nature? His character? His requirements?
Regardless of where the information comes from, we have a definition of a clean room, of who God is and what we are to look like. If you’ve been a believer for any length of time, that definition might just have become, over time, something vastly different than reality. What if, like twelve year old me, your definition of God and your life in Him isn’t the definition given by the One who requires a holy life? What if you're missing that cup on the dresser or shoe under the bed? What if the definition of what a believer is and does is different from what you’ve come to rest in?
“Oh..that’s the details,” you say? ”Those are the things I’m going to have to work on for the rest of my life and God knows that.” Well let me ask a question that I’ve been asking my own heart over the last several months. Is there any possibility that someone could read the word everyday and not see everything they should? Is it possible to go to church and love to be around people and read the Bible and miss the definition? Yes. Because we get used to things..like the cup on the dresser or paper on the bedside table..things that have been there so long they’ve just become part of the room. When someone points them out or maybe we read a verse that says something simple like, “Think only on things that are honorable and good,” do we quickly dismiss it by saying..the room is clean enough...my life, holy enough?
Is it? Are you sure? Have you searched the word diligently...yourself? Have you yourself read the verses that define the life of a believer? Are there even scriptures that define the life of a believer? Are there any verses that say, if you are a true believer, your life will look like this, you will do these things? What do you do if there are those verses and you don't actually do those things? Chalk it up to, “Well, I’m not perfect?” But wait, what if the verse doesn’t say “You’ll TRY to be this thing to the best of your ability,” what if it says emphatically, “You WILL be this thing, you WILL do these things?” Where do you stand if you can honestly say that isn’t me and has never been me? “Well God, I tried to keep the room as clean as I could...it’s what seemed right to me”
What if, in the end, God says in return, “You may have been doing good and right things but not my definition, my standard. By doing it your own way, even if it was in my name, you proved that you never knew Me. Depart from Me, I never knew you.”
The Word says over and over and over, don’t be deceived into thinking you’ve got it all right...at any time in your life, First Corinthians 10:12 says, ”Therefore let him who thinks he stands, take heed lest He fall.” The moment we think, “I’m done...room clean” is the moment we stop looking with God’s eyes. We are commanded to always look at the word and diligently, day after day, do the things written in it, that is what keeps us from becoming blind. “But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves,” ...trick their own hearts into thinking everything is ok.
The swiftness with which an eye can become blind makes it necessary for us to put on fresh eyes every time we read scripture..look at it as if it is the first time you are reading it and with the understanding that in these pages, these words, God is telling me who He is and how I am to live out His definition.
When I look at the Word with fresh eyes several things happen...I begin to see the areas in my own life that need to be cleaned out, the sins and things of the world that I have grown to love more than Him. These are the things that have been there so long they’ve become a part of me. When I read with new eyes, I see that when the word says, “Put aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted which is able to save your soul” or “Let your mind dwell on those things that are honorable, right, pure, lovely, of good repute, or worthy of praise,” it really means me... not a future me or a possible me but a today me. Do you actually see the evidence of these verses in your life, today?
When I look with fresh eyes at the Word, then the God I’ve almost grown accustomed to, the God, although I would never say it out loud, I think I’ve just about got figured out, becomes the unimaginable God that is above my highest thought. I see a God that has orchestrated every detail in every human being that has ever lived in order to display His glory. When you begin to think about the ramifications of this kind of God being the God you say you know, it’s almost like stepping out of a building into a hurricane force wind.. your breath is taken away. We talk often about the glory of God and how we love this glorious God.. like we love the beach or a piece of chocolate cake. Yet, when we read accounts of men seeing the glory of God in the Bible, we see that they become speechless, fall down, tremble greatly, or claim their own unworthiness. Isaiah cries out, “Woe to me, for I am lost!” He instantly sees his own unworthiness as he utters ”I’m a man of unclean lips.. among a people of unclean lips” The Israelites beg Moses to ask God not to speak to them directly anymore as the mountain shook with His glory. When Peter saw the glory of God revealed through the miracle of Jesus providing a full catch to fishermen who could find no fish all through the night, He falls to the ground crying ”Depart from me, for I am a sinful man”
When we look with fresh eyes at the glory of God, we tremble then at who has called our name and bow our head that He should look upon us. Do you tremble anymore?
If I already think my life to be holy, or think I’ve pretty much figured out the God of the universe, then my eyes will only see my definition. I will read the word but not apply to my own life the verses that God says are evidence that I know Him and He knows me. When He says, “I require holiness in the inner man“ we will, like I did with my mom, say, “Who’s going to look in the drawers?? It doesn’t matter!” But like my mom, God will say, “It matters to me and I’m the one that makes the requirements. You want to say your room is clean, your life lived for me?” “Then it has to be my definition, not yours.” And here’s the truth that we don’t like to admit or speak out loud: God requires a clean room. Yes, while we are alive, during this time of our stay on earth, He says, “You shall be Holy for I am Holy” (1 Peter 1:16) The room is expected to be clean and I am expected to keep looking at the instructions on how to accomplish this task. I can not claim I didn’t know, I cannot claim “He understands I’m just a sinner” He has given me the instructions and I am expected to look...even held responsible because I had the definition but chose mine over His. This is no easy task. This requires more than just a want to be holy or a longer time in the word. This requires fresh eyes.
In the gospels we see over and over Jesus telling his disciples that the religious leaders had eyes that were blind. That while seeing, they did not see and even though they could hear, they would not understand. They believed their rooms to meet the standard. They had grown so used to the things that needed to be taken care of, repented of, they no longer saw them as sins. Those things had become part of the room. Paul in his letter to the Church at Ephesus, says I pray that the eyes of your heart might be enlightened...opened to see the riches of God and also opened to see what you are missing.
I used to think, with my mom, my room will never be clean..she’s always going to see something I missed. As a believer that trembles at the glorious God who would give Himself to be known, I can only say, "I am yours, my life belongs to you." This is my reality. This is the truth. I don’t fight Him then when He says, “Your room will never be cleaned here on earth..your holiness will ever need pruning and refining. Through the word I am going to point out, expose, shine a light on the things you are missing.” His glory humbles my heart and causes it to say, "I know it’s not clean. Can you come in and show me what I’ve missed and am still missing so I can meet your standards and not think mine are enough?"
If your time in the word does not yield conviction, a better understanding and awe of the character and nature of God than you had yesterday, a quicker understanding of your own inabilities and need for Christ, and an increasing growth in looking more like Christ...if your time in the word is another day of reading something you already knew then maybe it’s time to walk out of the room and come back in with fresh eyes.