Flush First, Scrub Second

Hello There,

Turns out its August and the summer is almost over. Yesterday, or so it seems, I just finished writing that Father’s day post. I spent a good portion of this week organizing things to get ready for the 2016-2017 school year which is quickly approaching! Where did June & July go? I think I missed them when I blinked.

Lucas is now a 1 year old. This means I have been a stay at home dad for 8 months and counting. It really doesn’t seem like it was that long ago but here we are at close to a year. This summer has been a lot of fun. We’ve been to the pool and the mountains; my niece came and spent a few nights with us. The kids also attended a plethora of kid’s camps and vacation bible schools. To top it all off I have a brand new nephew! Exciting times.

Last week I fulfilled a lifelong dream to be a part of the dynamic duo! Shhh, don’t give away my secret identity.

Antioch’s VBS theme this year was Heroes. It only took 6 years of campaigning to get this! I had an amusing conversation with one of our members. Every night I was a different hero with co-coordinating hair color to match.

Member: Wow, you really went all out for VBS this year.
Me: Thanks. It’s been fun.
Member: So did you go out and buy all this stuff?
Me: No, I already owned it.

One of the things we’ve implemented recently around the house is chores. Everyone gets age appropriate chores and I’m working on being better at consistently enforcing them.

We have 3 bathrooms so each kid is assigned a bathroom to clean. This largely involves just wiping down all the surfaces (sinks, counters, etc.) and a quick scrub of the toilet with the toilet brush. You scrub it every day and it doesn’t take a lot of effort to keep it clean.

The other week it was chore time and things were humming along nicely. The kids were doing chores and Squish was eating cheerios. However, soon I started hearing a soft pitiful whimpering coming from the kids bathroom. I go in to see what is happening and Anna is in a ball on the floor holding her knees crying.

Me: Boo, what’s wrong?
AK: *pitiful mumbles*
Me: Boo, I can’t help you if you don’t tell me.
AK: I couldn’t clean the toilet.
Me: Why not?
*At this point I had not yet looked at the toilet itself*
AK: I tried to but it got stuck on the brush and I couldn’t get it off and I just keep scrubbing and it got worse and worse.
*Imagine that last sentence as a pitiful wailing, kinda of like an adorable baby banshee*

At this point I go to check the toilet and there was poop everywhere. All over the bowl, the seat, etc. I then open the brush holder and find the toilet brush with a huge glob of poop stuck on it. Ewwww. It turns out that the last person to use the toilet did not flush it. Also, Anna did not flush it before she started cleaning it. She then proceeded to make a huge mess and then once she realized she could only make the mess worse she had a small meltdown.

I’m going to pause for a minute and go back in time close to 8 years. Shortly after Madison’s birth Pastor Dave told me “Congratulations! Being a parent is really going to help your understanding of The Bible.” Now I scoffed at that when I first heard it. Understand the Bible? I just graduated from seminary. I have an understanding of The Bible. Boy was I ever wrong.

I hear a lot of excuses as to why people aren’t going to church. They vary, and after 10 years of ministry it’s rare to hear a new one. One of the ones I hear most frequently is “I’d like to come to church but there are some things in my life that I need to straighten out first.” The first time I heard it I had been a Christian for a month or two and was surprised to actually hear that. It shows acknowledgement of their sin in that they have things in their life that do not line up with God and they know that those things need to change. It also shows reverence for God in not wanting to show up at His house in a unworthy manner. However, it also shows a tremendous amount of pride in thinking that we can in any way/shape/form clean up the sin our life without Christ.

You know what that is really don’t you? It’s Anna trying to clean the toilet with a huge blob of poop stuck on the end of it. All we really do when we try to “clean up” our lives without Christ is just smear the sin around and make a huge mess. Until finally we come to the point where we realize that we need to ask our Father for help. Ideally, that’s where we should start with our problems, not use as a last resort.

Once I saw the messy bathroom and got AK stop crying we dealt with the problem.  We flushed the toilet, rinsed out the brush and holder, properly scrubbed the toilet, and thoroughly disinfected the bathroom. Now, when its chore time, Anna knows to flush first, scrub second.

Love you guys!
Sola Scriptura!
Pastor Glen

P.S. I went all of July without forgetting the diaper bag! Of course, now I’m likely to forget it again.