Sweep out the dust

Floors attract dust. There's no getting around it.  It happens.  Each floor is different, and the mess that accumulates varies from room to room, depending on the type of floor and the foot traffic blazing trails atop it.  Some floors sparkle--until the dog prances in from peeing in the rain--and other floors make fantastic skating rinks for sock-clad kids and kids at heart.  In some places, the floor is covered in a ruffled carpet, slightly tinged with the stain of decaying skin cells and maybe the red Kool-Aid Rorshach that mom tried so hard to scrub out.

Whatever the floor, they need to be cleaned at some point or another. It's inevitable. It doesn't matter where you live, you will have to sweep the floor at least once before you die.  If you're unfortunate enough to have to sweep carpet for lack of a vacuum, you might wish you would die, but nevertheless, it is possible to sweep dirt out of carpet.

But I digress.

Floors get pretty grody and the upkeep never ends.  Sweeping is just one of those chores that never quits.  It's not a hard job but it is continuous.

It's kind of like salvation.

Now, from my limited understanding of Biblical Greek after two semesters of it, I can tell you the word translated as "work out" is χατεργάζεσθε which if I am understanding it correctly, is second-person plural (present continuous) imperative. That means it's a command to y'all (directed at the Phillipians, and by extension us) to continue to work out where in our lives we need more Jesus. Simply put, salvation is a process that we have to keep working on.

But like with sweeping, we are useless on our own. Without a broom, all we're good for is kicking the dirt around (while simultaneously contributing to the mess with the scuff flaking off our feet).

Salvation is the same way, because we're powerless to accomplish it on our own--God is the one who sweeps the dust out of us.

That's just dandy, isn't it? If we sweep our floors, we can work out our salvation? It's as easy as that?

While it is an easy task, it's never a simple one, not if done properly.

Think about everything you have to sweep around and under if you don't want the floor to look like a disheveled wreck.  I'm not talking about moving the couch or disassembling the entire room to scour every corner, but Lord knows your garage or living room probably needs it.  I'm just talking about the mundane sweeping we should do regularly.

It can be difficult to reach into those tight corners or squeeze the bristles under the toekick to coax out the crusty Cheerio the family pooch neglected to find.  Likewise, it's not always easy to let God have access to every filthy crevice or grimy mound inside ourselves.  We might know these areas need cleaning, but we're hesitant to go to that much trouble.

Let's say you go to the trouble of fishing the dirt out into the open. Have you ever tried to sweep it into a pile before introducing it to the dustpan, only to have a rogue power cord get in the way? One of the most annoying things I find is having to lift power cords and wires to sweep a pile of dirt under and away from them.  Sometimes, we let God work on us, but maybe we let circumstances get in the way, or perhaps it's our own pride or emotions.

But really, sweeping isn't so bad.  It's easy enough a kid can do it, and frankly, it's more like dancing than dust-collecting.  The reward is so worth it, the rejuvenated life a swept floor can bring to a room.  If nothing else, a swept floor just feels more liveable, friendlier even.

If we think of working out our salvation the same way, the joy it will bring far outperforms the mere act of sweeping.  All we have to do is let God work on us, and worship him for what he's doing as he does it, and keep it up.  It's pretty simple, really.

That's kind of where I'm at right now in my life.  I'm about a year out from getting my Masters of Divinity and after that, I'm looking forward to going to France as a church planter; I already have a job offer to do just that, and I can see God orchestrated everything.  In the meantime, I'm working to prepare myself for the adventure ahead of me, trying to clean out all the spots of my life I've tracked dirt into over the years.  Bad habits, insecurities, and communication problems just always seem to sneak in but I'm not worried about any of it. I like sweeping, but sweeping me isn't my job, so I'm just going to step back so God can get those hard-to-reach parts of me.