Change your Spiritual Filter...
This may sound gross, but...
Last year, I started smelling a musty smell in my car.
But it wasn't consistent,
It was sporadic.
I looked for any food I dropped on the floor board,
Anything stuck in the crevices
Anything wet,
Perhaps even rotting,
I looked under the all the seats,
I vacuumed every nook and cranny,
And found nothing.
Eventually I made the correlation between the air conditioner and the smell.
Whenever I would turn it on,
There the smell would be.
Then the thought of air filters came up (thank You Holy Spirit),
And after searching online,
I bought the parts to replace myself.
So there I was under the hood of my car,
Pulling and taking things apart,
And when I pulled out the old air filter,
I was shocked and disgusted,
Cuz they were NAAAAASTTTYYY!
It was loaded with fuzzy gray dust and filth,
Not even sure if there was a hint of green,
I was like EEEEEEEWWW!!
I couldn't believe I was breathing that in my car. Soooo gross!! X_x
It turns out I was at least 30,000 mile and 4 years past due on changing the air filter.
Yeah, let's not do that again.
Changing it was easy and not expensive,
I was just negligent.
Myyy baaaddd~~~!
I tell you all this to say FORGIVENESS is...
Like your SPIRITUAL air filter.
It's got to be cleaned or changed regularly.
If not, it will get nasty and dirty,
It will start to create a stink,
It will affect your spiritually health and relationship with Jesus.
And just like an air filter will get dirty just as a part of life.
In life, people will hurt or offend us,
We will hurt and offend others,
And we will clog up our spiritual air filter with unforgiveness, grudges or hurts without even trying.
It's going to happen.
Some of these can be so small we don't even know it's there,
It's like a "micro-offense" or a "micro-grudge",
But it can add up and be just as toxic and harmful,
Perhaps even more dangerous because we don't think it as a big deal,
But it can definitely clog up your spiritual air filter.
That's why Jesus gave us this pattern to pray...
"Our Father in heaven...
Give us TODAY our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors..."
Note how Jesus said "Give us TODAY...",
This means we should pray for this DAILY,
Not a once a week or once in a while.
It's an absolutely necessary to ask God DAILY,
To provide our spiritual needs AND forgive others.
Forgiveness is a part of a healthy ON-GOING spiritual maintenance plan.
RE-asking for forgiveness,
RE-forgive others,
Is like cleaning your air filters.
Since there's no such thing as an air filter that never gets dirty,
It must be cleaned.
Since there's no such thing as a life where you don't get tweaked, irritated or offended,
You must keep forgiving others and be forgiven by God.
So don't do like me and get 30k miles or 4 years behind on changing air filters,
Change your spiritual air filters DAILY,
Forgive DAILY,
Ask for forgiveness DAILY.
Ask "Holy Spirit, is there anyone I need to forgive today? Is there any offense in my heart I need to release to You?".
If anyone come to mind, the solution is simple.
Simply pray, "Jesus, I forgive ______ and give this burden to You. Forgive me for holding on to any offense. Purify my heart. Make it white as snow. Thank You, In Jesus name, Amen."
Cheers to clean spiritual air filters and a lighter load!
Have a great day! ^_^
