A gurgling sound. Then, dark, grey, murky water, filled with floating bits of kitchen scraps and whatever else might be found in a drain system, bubbled up into the once sparkling white, clean bathtub. In an instant it could quite accurately be described as "filth and squalor". And needless to say, the stench of drain contents is enough to make anyone with functioning olfactories take a swift exit to escape the pollution. I guess I should be glad that it wasn't a drain system in a Korean apartment, where your neighbors' drain is also connected to the pipeline!
Nonetheless, such things in life do not automatically rectify themselves, and someone has to clean the mess, which I proceeded to do.
Oh the wealth of lessons that a humble, even repulsive drain held!
As I scrubbed at the gunk, it became so representative of much of the stuff with which we fill our minds. Like drains, they become clogged with the filth of worldly pursuits, entertainment, and even seemingly innocent things that take up our time. God longs to quench our thirst with His pure water of life, but we would rather drink at broken cisterns. And like a clogged drain won't let the clean water run down, so we don't even want to accept that refreshing stream. Instead of letting it cleanse us completely, we try to mix it in with our own junk, but it is polluted, its power lost.
As I thought about crystal clear, pure, refreshing drinking water, it seemed so wonderful in comparison to the nauseating drain water. I wouldn't want even a drop of contaminated water, or a speck of kitchen scraps to come near my drinking water. Yet I can be content so long as there's only a little bit of sin in my life? This can never be! I can't experience the blessing of the water of life God wants to give me if I insist on filling up on junk. He desires all, and the only way for me to have fullness of life is to give Him all. No reservations, not even a speck of dirt sticking to the side of the glass.
To my dismay, when I had the bath nice and clean, I discovered something rather disheartening. Although all the muck was cleaned away, the water wasn't going down properly, and a colony of drowned red ants floated up out of the drain. After getting rid of them, I realized the drain was still blocked, and so tried baking soda and vinegar, before getting out the plunger as a last resort. But, plunge as I might, little bits of rubbish kept floating up, and the drain remained blocked.
This was when I saw another important lesson. I can clean up the symtoms, and yet the problem still remains, waiting to resurface at the most inopportune times. What I need is a heart transformation. And this is something I cannot do for myself. I can plunge and work as hard as I want to, but, in and of myself, I don't have the resources to solve the problem. Only Jesus can get to that level and change me from within. Only He can scrape away the layers of grime caked on over years of life in a world of sin. Only He can unblock my brain from the mass of garbage I have willfully allowed to clog it. But here's the secret: this is something He wants to do! In fact, the only thing getting in the way of Him performing His incredible operation clean-up is my own stubbornness to keep my dirt. Really? Rejecting God's beautiful, refreshing streams of life-giving water for a stagnant cesspool? How tragic! What a ridiculous trade! Yet how often I make this very fateful exchange.
I pray that the lesson of the blocked drain will remain fresh in my memory. I pray that God will help me to recognize the true colour of that which this world dishes up as so desirable. That I will see it for what it really is: filth and squalor, repulsive. That I will lose my taste for it. And that I will acquire a love for the heavenly, living water, that quenches all thirst for all other, and springs up into everlasting life. Of that water I want
to drink deeply.
