We drove by the spillway at Lake Benbrook yesterday.
"What a horrible smell," Mike said. "That must be from the very bottom of the lake."
We're at the end of three months of hundred-plus degree heat. It's amazing there's any water in the lake at all.
Mike told me a story from his youth about going to another area lake one hot summer day. He had his air mattress prepared to enjoy a day of floating on the cool water. After he floated away from shore, he jumped into the water hoping to get good and wet, only to discover the water wasn't mostly water. He immediately sank up to his knees in slime. Gooey, oozing, slimy, gelatinous (Mike can be very descriptive), rotting vegetation that had collected, for who knows how long, several feet deep under the surface of the water. Worse yet was the odor of this rotting, stinking filth. The more he tried to get out of the, so called, water, the more he managed to cover himself in a coat of filth and a second coat of stink.
The nasty smell yesterday brought back vivid memories of his experience and kept me laughing as he shared his story. Knowing how hard it is for him to deal with bad smelling messes, made me laugh even harder.
Today, in my quiet time in a study on grace, I'm reflecting on a quote by A.W. Tozer, "...grace is: God's love flowing freely to the unlovely."
I begin to think: God's love flowing freely, like water flowing. Clean, clear, cool water that is gently washing over us.
The very thing Mike was looking for that long-ago day at the lake which instead turned him into the "unlovely" monster he became.
Sin is like that. We don't plan to get in over our heads but we do, everyday. Like Eve, I stand there looking at one bite out of that apple and wonder, "How did things get so bad, so fast?"
All of us prodigal children can get caught in the rotting, stinking filth of our own sin. The more we struggle, on our own, to get out of our messes, the worse things get.
Worst yet, our holy, sovereign, all powerful God can not come anywhere near us. Even if we clean up, we still stink...to high heaven.
God loved us too much to leave us in our mess. Thank you for loving us so much that you, fully God and fully man, as Jesus, came to rescue us. By Your sacrifice on the cross, we are clean, cleaner than clean. We are odor free by your clean, refreshing and restoring gift of grace.
The question from today's study, "...have you come to take it for granted or lost a sense of the wonder of what God has done for you?"
Not today, Lord. Thank you for using the stinky smell to guide me to the truth of God's great love for me and the wonder of Jesus great gift of grace. Amazing grace, how sweet the smell.
Mike told me a story from his youth about going to another area lake one hot summer day. He had his air mattress prepared to enjoy a day of floating on the cool water. After he floated away from shore, he jumped into the water hoping to get good and wet, only to discover the water wasn't mostly water. He immediately sank up to his knees in slime. Gooey, oozing, slimy, gelatinous (Mike can be very descriptive), rotting vegetation that had collected, for who knows how long, several feet deep under the surface of the water. Worse yet was the odor of this rotting, stinking filth. The more he tried to get out of the, so called, water, the more he managed to cover himself in a coat of filth and a second coat of stink.
The nasty smell yesterday brought back vivid memories of his experience and kept me laughing as he shared his story. Knowing how hard it is for him to deal with bad smelling messes, made me laugh even harder.
Today, in my quiet time in a study on grace, I'm reflecting on a quote by A.W. Tozer, "...grace is: God's love flowing freely to the unlovely."
I begin to think: God's love flowing freely, like water flowing. Clean, clear, cool water that is gently washing over us.
The very thing Mike was looking for that long-ago day at the lake which instead turned him into the "unlovely" monster he became.
Sin is like that. We don't plan to get in over our heads but we do, everyday. Like Eve, I stand there looking at one bite out of that apple and wonder, "How did things get so bad, so fast?"
All of us prodigal children can get caught in the rotting, stinking filth of our own sin. The more we struggle, on our own, to get out of our messes, the worse things get.
Worst yet, our holy, sovereign, all powerful God can not come anywhere near us. Even if we clean up, we still stink...to high heaven.
God loved us too much to leave us in our mess. Thank you for loving us so much that you, fully God and fully man, as Jesus, came to rescue us. By Your sacrifice on the cross, we are clean, cleaner than clean. We are odor free by your clean, refreshing and restoring gift of grace.
The question from today's study, "...have you come to take it for granted or lost a sense of the wonder of what God has done for you?"
Not today, Lord. Thank you for using the stinky smell to guide me to the truth of God's great love for me and the wonder of Jesus great gift of grace. Amazing grace, how sweet the smell.
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