As I reflect on the state of our nation during this 2016 Presidential Election...
Whether you live in an apartment, condo, or house, you are blessed by God to have shelter, a roof over your head. Sure you worked hard for it and to keep it. But that how we participate in God's gift of life and love, we work hard for it, to keep it.
All that we have, all that God has blessed us with, comes with the responsibility to keep it. To keep it not to my standards, but his. Which means I am supposed to care for what God provides. And that's often difficult.
Take for example, my home. We have a Jack 'n Jill bathroom. A bathroom, which many guests use. God has spoiled us with two sinks in this bathroom. I guess if one fails us, we have another to back it up. Or maybe we have two sinks so as to even the burden of the adjacent bedrooms. Either way, we have this Jack 'n Jill bathroom with two sink. And one day suddenly, one of the sinks got clogged.
Now when we bought this house, brand new, the builder went over various things about routine maintenence. Now this was very nice, but this wasn't our first brand new house. We knew how to maintain a house. We thought, "Yeah sure, we got this. Oh sure, we know. We'll get to it...when the time is right."
Sure we had good intentions and all, but we wanted to enjoy our new house. You know make it our own. There will be time later to worry about all that routine maintenance stuff.
Well, suddenly it wasn't. One day that sink didn't suddenly get clogged. Nope, it happened over time. Though it happened sooner than we thought, that sink got clogged because we neglected to take care of this beautiful gift of a brand new house. We knew what we should be doing, but we thought we could just deal with it later. Com'on we're trying to work to pay the bills, and enjoy all the reasons why we have all those bills. Plus we rarely used that sink.
This clogged sink was used almost exclusively by others, our guests. And none of them ever said a word to us. If only they would have said or done something, then I'm sure we would have done something sooner.
But there's that nagging reality that God gave us this gift of a house, and we are held responsible to maintain and care for our home.
So what caused this sink to clog up? This sink that was rarely used by others who should have said something? Well this sink is special, one of a kind in our house. This sink has a drain pipe connected from the A/C. And living in Texas, that A/C is definitely used year round by everyone who sleeps, eat, spends time in our home. So that's a lot of cold and hot air blowing! And where's all that condensation going? Down that drain pipe connected to that Jack 'n Jill special sink.
Unfortunately it was too late for the routine maintenance of bleach. No sir, bleaching the problem wasn't going to resolve the issue. The sink was too clogged up with too much filth. Drastic situations call for drastic measures. We needed a plumber. And so a plumber we got. And that plumber went to town with the roto-rooter. He, not us, cleaned the pipe. It was a dirty job, but that's what happened because of our negligence.
We knew then, we couldn't just wait once a year, or whenever the filth got so bad it cloggs up the sink. We have to keep to a regular routine of maintenence and cleaning, if we are to truly care for our home.
So this election has brought us plenty of filth. I'm not sure if it's the worst ever, and God help us if we play that distracting game of who's got it worse. Regardless we have only ourselves to blame for the filthy clogged drain we have before us.
Now you might say that you rarely used my sink. But did you ever notice the clog? Did you say anything about it? Maybe you did.
Did you tell others that the pipes might be getting dirty? Maybe you did.
Did you rise to the occasion and offer to help clean the pipe? Fix the pipe? Clear the pipe yourself? Offer to replace it?
Better yet have you ever offered to come over to my home on a regular basis and help with the routine maintenance? Take the trash out? Wash dishes? Vacuum the floors? Scrub toilets? Dust blinds?
Do you see how much cleanliness is necessary in house to routinely maintain a home? We all desire a clean home, but are we all willing to do what is necessary to keep our home clean?
If we pledge allegiance to this great nation as "Under God," then this home of ours is a gift from God. Our common home needs constant care on a regular basis because that's what is required for living.
Our moral obligation goes beyond election day. We must work hard on a daily basis of routine maintenance to keep this home clean.
