I’m not normally a shoe person but I love white sneakers (and boots… I love boots… but I digress, today I’m not talking about boots, I’m talking about sneakers… Focus!!). I have several pairs of white sneakers and I wear them a lot, but some days I can’t wear my sneakers because I don’t have a clean pair.
And that’s the trouble with white sneakers… they get dirty very quickly. I can put a clean white pair of sneakers on in the morning and by the afternoon they have all manner of dirt and marks on them… no matter how careful I have been to keep them clean. I have tried lots of ways to clean my sneakers. I’ve washed them in the washing machine, and I’ve tried painting them with white shoe paint but even though they seem clean at first, as they dry the marks re-appear and they look dirty again.
While I have ways of making my sneakers look white again, nothing I do will make them look like they were when they were new. So, I’ve discovered the only way to get clean, white sneakers again is to buy a new pair, which depending on what brand you buy, can be quite expensive!
Hymn writer Robert Lowry wrote in 1876
“What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow, no other fount I know. Nothing but the blood of Jesus”
Most days, I am exactly like my sneakers. I start off in the morning clean and fresh but as the day goes on, stuff happens, and I get scuffed and dirty. A harsh word, a disappointment, an inconvenience… and before I know it, my thoughts, words and actions don’t line up as they should. Good intentions are great, but we need to make the effort to stay ‘clean’. Just as I would avoid jumping in a muddy puddle with my clean sneakers, we should be trying to avoid the dirt of sin in our daily lives. It only takes a second for the mud to stick… or a moment to be ruined.
Just as I can’t get my sneakers as clean as new by covering up the stains, we can’t erase our sin by trying to cover it up. Romans 3:23-24 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus”. The only way we can be made new is by receiving and accepting Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross.
When I need to buy new shoes, I go to the cheaper shops, I don’t buy big name brands because I don’t like to pay more than I have to. But God thought we were worth so much that He paid the ultimate price for us…. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only son, so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life…”
My sneakers will always look dirty, no matter how hard I try to clean them and likewise we will always have the stain of sin in our lives unless we accept the gift of forgiveness and salvation that is offered to us when we accept Jesus as our Saviour. It is ours for free and is freely available to us… but it cost Him everything. He died so that we could live.
How will you allow Him to ‘wash you clean’ today?
