Dirty Children & Stain Remover

Dirty Children and Stain Remover

What is it about children that attract dirt like a magnet?  Why do Spaghettios have to be so red that they stain the faces of children forever, not to mention their clothes?  Why is grape juice enhanced to be so purple that children’s tongues look like they have no circulation and are about to fall off after drinking it?  Why is blue candy so fascinating to children other than it seems to be a fast track to the permanent color of tattoos?  Stains are a particular peeve of mine, which is one reason that I seldom wear white. 

Coming from the black, black dirt of North Texas, our sons have long known that Mom has a clean fetish.  When they were babies, we had a plastic covered high chair, in lieu of one of the fancy wooden ones, so that I could simply take them and the high chair out into the warm Texas heat and hose them down after eating and before I got them out of their chairs.  I don’t think those boys ever went down at night without baths.  Both of them still take showers in the morning and at night.  I am afraid that some of that clean fetish – though, sadly, not all – rubbed off on both Scott and Jamie, much to their dismay and chagrin.

I can remember one particular time when our older son was about 3 years old and our younger son was a toddler.  They were out playing in the backyard when they found the dog’s water bowl, which they promptly dumped onto a bare batch of dirt.  They created the most disgusting black glue out of that dirt and proceeded to completely cover one another in it, practicing the ancient art of body art, war paint, and macho markings imaginable.  Though the house was open and the yard was fenced, I realized after only a few moments that they were way too quiet! 

Rushing out the back door, I found them so covered that the only things I could see were their teeth and their eyes.  As I groaned loudly at the mess, Jamie, our younger son, saw me out of the corner of eye.  Proudly, he toddled over to me, with arms up-stretched, calling, Mommy, Mommy.  Kiss, kiss!  Bath first, needless to say, as I picked him up with outstretched arms, but only after I hosed him off and carried him to the bathtub! 

I think my shortcoming in being able to get past the dirt, sometimes, is one reason that Romans 5:8 is so precious in my own life:  But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.  In other words, when I was at my dirtiest and filthiest, God loved me so much that He stretched out His arms of love by allowing His only begotten Son to die for me on the cross of Calvary.  He didn’t wait for me to clean myself up.  No one had to hose me off first.  I didn’t have to find a stain remover before He would love me; His love was the stain remover.  He saw past my dirt and loved me anyway.  When we impose restrictions and requirements on our love for others because of the dirt in their lives, may God help us to remember His unconditional love extended to us before the blood of Jesus washed those stains away.

© 2011 Gerry Sisk

(02/16/11)