Laundry: My Weakness!

So,what am I doing bloggin' in the middle of the afternoon? I know...CRAZY!! Well, I have spent the day with these two ladies who have done an amazing amount of work and brought me to tears!
Yes, many who know me know that laundry usually brings me to tears because as I share, "it is just not my strength, girls!" I can get the beds made, pick up the house, take out the trash, dust and vacuum, plan menus, grocery shop, and keep the dishes done (almost everyday), but the laundry always lingers undone! So, after a week with a hubby and his terrible cold, a preschooler with an unexpected accident at 3 am, and a week including a 4 mile family hike complete with waterfall, preschool pumpkin patch field trip, and day trip to West Virginia...the mounds of whites and darks turned into moun-tains!

Today was the day! I was so proud of this accomplishment! I know there are women out there who know how this feels! :) Hooray!!

(Notice that I took a picture of the completed pile, not the numerous piles in the laundry room floor! We all know how THAT feels, too!) So, I am not done with the laundry, but it was somewhere in this basket that the tears came and I just HAD to share!

I came across one wash cloth and thought, "Wow, really rugged around the edges." Then another towel and thought, "Boy, you have seen better days." Yes, I was talking to the laundry! All the while, I was envisioning opening beautifully wrapped boxes with glittery bows Christmas morning filled with lush white linens as I inhaled the fresh Bounce scent...HINT...HINT!

But then, I picked up the dish cloth. I think he was used as a oven mitt in the heat of getting dinner ready one especially busy night. Although freshly brightened with bleach, his navy blue stripes were ignored due to the enormous black (maybe burned) stain in the upper corner. For a moment, I thought, "Need to throw THAT ONE out for sure" and then I just couldn't do it. It just wasn't that bad. Whether it was still a dish cloth or a new dusting rag, it hit me. I felt sure, "It still has a lot of Life in it!" Then, the Holy Spirit washed over me!

Doesn't Jesus use us with stains...marks, even scars?!

He knows that we are all different to begin with, right?
And, He gifts us all in different and various ways through the Holy Spirit!
Plus, we all go through life with different loads, too! Ever thought of that?!
But today, as I folded that little dish cloth just as nicely as the newer ones and stacked it up to be placed in the linen closet...I thought, there will be a time I will use you.


[Sniff, sniff] Yes, I cried over the laundry. I needed a break. I was overwhelmed with "my laundry."

I took the break. How many times have I been guilty of thinking that God can't use me or worse, doesn't want to use me? I have been mistaken to think that I need to do something in order to be used...I just need to get a little bit better, or I just need to organize my time more, or I just need the right motivation, or....

The TRUTH is that God wants to use us. Right now. We need to let Him work in us, not us dictate what the to-do list is for Him. Let Him decide what needs to be washed, removed, freshened, softened. He will show you. One load at a time. He will do the work. He will get the laundry done. Ask.

Paul said it best as he wrote to the church at Corinth, "But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." God knows that I fret about the laundry. It is just never done. And that is ok because He wants to perfect us, renew us, even change us from glory to glory . Until then, get in there! Get going! Be usable! Be open!

I am. Friends, spiritually and literally, there are more loads to do. But, I am glad that I don't have to do them ALL!