Getting scrubbed.

Psalm 51 says:

1 Generous in love - God, give grace! Huge in mercy - wipe out my bad record. 2 Scrub away my guilt, soak out my sins in your laundry. 3 I know how bad I've been; my sins are staring me down. 4 You're the One I've violated, and you've seen it all, seen the full extent of my evil. You have all the facts before you; whatever you decide about me is fair. 5 I've been out of step with you for a long time, in the wrong since before I was born. 6 What you're after is truth from the inside out. Enter me, then; conceive a new, true life.

7 Soak me in your laundry and I'll come out clean, scrub me and I'll have a snow-white life. 8 Tune me in to foot-tapping songs, set these once-broken bones to dancing. 9 Don't look too close for blemishes, give me a clean bill of health. 10 God, make a fresh start in me, shape a Genesis week from the chaos of my life. 11 Don't throw me out with the trash, or fail to breathe holiness in me. 12 Bring me back from gray exile, put a fresh wind in my sails!

What I think is super great about this passage is that this passage shares that the psalmist is being honest with himself and with God about who he is and where he has been. He is being vulnerable about life and being willing to be molded into who God is desiring him to be. It is ONLY through God that chaos is ceased, that trash is saved, that renewed life is given. I wouldn't say that I've been living a life of sin. I honestly think that I am walking closely with Jesus these days. Its been great to be in conversation with him and hearing discernment and peace come from his lips in regards to relationships with friends, buying a new car (which I did today!), seeking his will for my future, making decisions, and traveling that I am doing.

SO, why this verse for today? Well, I think that we all need a constant reminder to seek out the Lord no matter what place we are in with him. No one is perfect and no one can judge or cleanse, except the Lord. Tomorrow starts a crazy adventure of March for me. I am heading off to Sweden for a seminary class, will be with my friend Aaron for a few days after that in Gothenburg, then I am off to California, after that I am going to St. Croix. These are three extremely different trips and at the same time, I want to be entering each of these trips with clean slates. I can't be concerned about what the world thinks, but I should be concerned with what the Lord thinks. So, Lord, scrub and scrape away. Get me ready for that foot-stomping music to your ear. Thanks for the grace you give and take delight in who you are molding me and shaping me to be.