This week’s guest post comes to us from

Jessica Champion

Jessica is the owner of 25 Hours Consulting (a boutique marketing firm specializing in web design and resume services) and proud mom of 2 living in Medford, NJ. Read more about Jessica on her website.

Have you ever tried to clean something but only ended up making it worse?

Try and try as you might, it just won’t come clean. 

You’re scrubbing, you’re scraping, you’re pouring on the soap and the solvents…

But nothing’s dissolving this stain. 

You’re elbow-deep in grease, your arms are sore from the effort, you’re choking on the fumes — yet this stubborn mess just won’t budge. Then you take a step back and think,

“Maybe I’m too close to it. Maybe if I look at it from back here, it’ll give me a different perspective. Maybe if I take a break and come back to it, then it won’t look so bad.” 

But to your dismay, things appear to be even worse from your new vantage point. All your frenzied effort just spread the mess around. Now you’re standing in a new stain. You were so busy trying to muscle the filth out of one thing, that the mess spilled out onto the clean area around you, without you even noticing. 

This was me a couple of weeks ago, trying to clean my husband’s grill. Trying to be a “good wife.” It was 97 degrees outside, and I was sweating in the blazing hot sun. I had the foresight to put some cardboard down underneath the grill and move it off the deck into the grass, and I thought that would contain the drips and the mess. I was proud of myself and thought my unsolicited effort would earn me some points in the “good wife” department. 

But what I hadn’t thought of was the wind blowing the commercial-strength chemicals onto the synthetic deck behind me. I also hadn’t thought to remove the drip pan, so all that greasy, rusty residue that had accumulated there began to seep out onto the deck when I gave up and moved the grill back to its original position. 

Now I had an even bigger problem than a halfway-clean grill: a stained deck. 

“He’s going to be so mad,” I thought. Here I was, just trying to help, and now I’d created a bigger problem - one that I didn’t know how to fix, didn’t have time to fix, and felt compelled to hide. 

In my panic, I reached out to a friend who owns a commercial cleaning company and asked him what I could buy at a local store that might help my cause. I sent him a picture of the stain on the deck and he said, “Wow, I don’t know if you’ll be able to get that out. But, if anything can, it’s this.” He told me about a special kind of cleaner and brush I could use on the stain. 

I covered up the stain until I could get to the store a couple of days later. A couple of days of silent panicking, worrying my husband would notice, and wondering if giving it this much time to soak in was making it a lost cause. 

Later in the week, I bought the materials, came home from the store, and followed my friend’s instructions while my husband was at work. To my surprise and relief, it worked! The stain came out of the deck! I had to stop for the day, but I was relieved that my big problem had shrunk back to its original size. Now I only had to finish cleaning the grill - but this time I would be smarter about it. I hid the supplies in the back of the cleaning cabinet where my husband would never look. 

A couple more days passed. There had been rain, and sunshine to dry it. As I walked through my kitchen I glanced out my window, ready to once again admire my resourcefulness and have a private laugh at what had almost been a disaster. 

But to my surprise - the stain was back! 

If you’re still with me, forgive me for burying the lead, and thank you for entertaining my metaphor. 

To be transparent, this is where the story ends - at least the part about the grill and the deck. The stain remains, weeks later, in spite of my best intentions to make time to try to clean it again. And I still worry that my husband will notice it. I haven’t “come clean” to him yet, but I’ve done something else. 

I’ve come to realize that my story is a metaphor for sin, and for what happens when we try to “fix” things in our own strength. I’ve come to realize that the stain on the deck could be viewed as a metaphor for my impure motives. I wasn’t just being helpful, I was trying to win “good wife” points — I was seeking man’s approval, not letting my efforts glorify God without strings attached. The stain on the deck was an outward reminder of the stain on my soul.

That thing inside of us that aches for approval, for appreciation, for whatever we feel we’re lacking here on earth, it can control us if we’re not careful. Sure, this might be a pretty benign example, but I don’t have to tell you that unchecked sin of any size can affect everything in its vicinity and bleed into other areas of your life. The stain was my peripheral sin.

There I was, foolishly charging ahead in haste, doing something I had no business doing. Without taking better precautions, without doing my homework — my lack of knowledge and preparation caused more damage than good. It exacerbated an already-bad situation. And it might’ve ruined someone else’s property (the jury’s still out on that one). 

Furthermore, in covering up the stain, I was allowing it to spread to my heart and my mind. The sin of deceit was causing me worry that compounded with each passing day. 

Proverbs 3:5 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.”

What would’ve happened if I’d just left the task of cleaning the grill up to my husband? Maybe his territory should stay his territory. Maybe I should’ve said, “Here, honey. I made a mess of the grill and I bought you this fancy cleaner because I thought it might help, but I don’t want to mess anything up. Would you like to show me how to use it so I can clean it for you?”

Or, what if I had come clean and said, “Honey, I’m really sorry but I tried to scrub the grill and I made a mess of the deck. I was trying to surprise you and I thought I was being careful, but I wasn’t prepared for the residue to spread. Is there some way I can help fix this?” 

But I didn’t do either of those things. I still haven’t. Because I needed to come clean to God first. Almost on cue, God sent Galatians 1:10 to mind and put a check in my spirit. It says, “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.” 

Although I had good intentions and tried to do something nice (and seemingly harmless) for my husband, I was seeking his approval while doing it and trying to make myself look good. I needed to apologize to my Father in heaven for my selfish motivations and ask Him to cleanse my heart and guide me before I could decide how to proceed. 

And that’s where I am. Thankfully, in His infinite mercy, He always meets us where we are. Whether we’re in the backyard scrubbing a grill with a wire brush on a hot summer day, or we’re celebrating just a little too much at a friend’s barbecue. We know that if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).

Whatever your metaphorical stain is, if you prepare your heart by bringing it to God and allowing Him to clarify your motives, He’ll help you (and your grill) come clean. Now God, please make my heart and my deck clean again and may my husband be as merciful as you are. Amen.

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