It isn’t looking too good.
We are going to have to work on it. Wade out on the mucky pond bottom that sticks to our feet and sucks us down. We are going to have to brave the turtles and maybe snakes to get the job done.
I’ll have to get my boots out, figure out how to drag the dead limbs out and get out the junk plastic that has blown into the little pond.
Maybe I can tie the limbs to the riding lawn mower and drag them up the bank and out. If I can just move around and keep my boots on! I think the ruckus I’ll make will keep the snakes away!
High temperatures have evaporated lots of water out of the little pond near our house. We haven’t had much rain to replenish the water. The trees that line the pond that have been here for a long time still continue to pull out water to live.
Inevitably, the water level has gone down, down, down. The roots of the trees twist and loop around the pond banks and we can see what has been hidden by the higher water level before.
How did a tire get in there! And how long has it been there? The trees have dropped some messy dead branches to clutter up the banks. Plastic has blown across the driveway and slid into the water.
It will look so much better when we get it cleaned out —I hope I’ll have some help in this muddy job!
It’s surprising what the smooth surface of the pond water has kept covered up. As long as we didn’t see it, we didn’t really know what needed to be done and it wasn’t too important to get it cleaned up.
We let our lives get in a similar condition as our little pond. As we go along day by day, we let our sin be covered up, and we can look pretty good on the outside.
But if we look deep inside our hearts, minds, actions, souls and what motivates us — we see trash, deadness and sin. To get below the surface and see what is in the depths of our lives, we need to have some help. The Holy Spirit will come to our aid if we ask God to reveal what we are lacking, what we are doing that isn’t pleasing to God, and where we fall short of His will.
And although it might not be fun, we can physically clean up the little pond. However, we can’t clean up our own sin and pay the penalty for it. We need God’s help! Christ paid the penalty for our sin on the cross. He offers us forgiveness through His grace and our faith. In the Bible in 1 John 1:9, we read: “Expose what’s wrong, stop hiding the depth of it, ask God for a thorough cleansing.”
It’s time to get our spiritual boots on and, with God’s help, rake out the muck!
