Cleansing

Friday in the First Week of Lent

Wash me through and through from my wickedness

and cleanse me from my sin.

Psalm 51:2

After walking by it three times, I finally pick up my fleece sweater and examine the stain again. It has been lying in a heap for more than a week, since Shrove Tuesday when an unnoticed piece of chocolate melted in its folds. I have been ignoring it because I have not had time to hand wash it and because I am afraid to find out it is ruined, that the stain cannot be removed.

There is no time like the present. I head to the laundry room and apply myself to removing the oily mess, then set the sweater to soak in the prescribed cleaning solution. I am relieved when this seems to do the trick; I think the stain is gone. As I rinse it out in order to throw it in the washing machine with the rest of a load, it occurs to me that this is a bit silly. It is already washed—why not just finish it by hand?

I usually find hand-washing a chore for which I have neither the time nor the patience. But as I scrub and rinse the sweater several times, I discover a soothing rhythm to it and a gentle attentiveness. And I imagine God, hand-washing me with similar care. 

I am overwhelmed then by a vision of God washing each of us by hand. Patiently. Lovingly. And in God’s hands, no one is ruined beyond repair, and there is no stain that cannot be removed.

Copyright: / 123RF Stock Photo