It’s spring! I love this time of year! It’s starting to warm up; tiny green leaves are making their appearance on branches of trees, and multi-colored flowers are beginning to bloom! Everything is so beautiful!
Another thing that often happens at this time of year is my annual spring cleaning! I “invite” my granddaughters to help me clean the dusty nooks and crannies, wash the curtains, and vacuum under the bed and behind the furniture! It’s a job, but when we are done, everything sparkles!
I can clean just about anything I want… my house, my car, my clothes, my dishes… I could list a bunch of things, but there’s one thing that I cannot get clean no matter how hard I try or how many cleaning supplies I use.
I cannot clean my heart. I don’t mean my physical heart that is beating inside my body. When I talk about a heart that is unclean, I am referring to my life, which is dirty with sin. It doesn’t matter how much I try to “clean up my act”… the truth is I cannot get rid of the darkness of sin that lives within me.
Even if I try and do good things, like obey the speed limit, or give money to charities, or even by coming to church, my heart doesn’t get clean from sin. Isaiah 64:6 states, “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.” All my good works, my works of “righteousness”, are like dirty rags to God! Can you imagine that? There is nothing I can do that will make me clean in God’s eyes! That also means that I cannot get into heaven with a dirty sinful heart because God doesn’t allow anything that isn’t clean into heaven. You see, heaven is perfect and without the presence of sin all the time. There are never any messes to clean up… no garbage cans, no muddy floors, no filthy hands, and NO DIRTY HEARTS!
But there’s good news! There is someone who can clean up a dirty heart! That someone is the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s beloved Son! He alone can make a sinful heart clean! When Jesus died on the cross, taking the burden of all our dirty sins upon Himself, He made a way for us to become clean and be acceptable to God! The Bible says that Jesus is the only way to obtain salvation – the forgiveness of sins. “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
However, there is one caveat. This doesn’t happen automatically. When my house is dirty, the broom and duster don’t start cleaning all by themselves. I have to take action to clean the dirty places. It’s the same for getting the dirty sin out of my heart. Even though it is Jesus who washes away my sins, I have to take action first, but it’s super simple!
Once I realized that my heart was filled with sin, my action was to ASK Jesus to forgive me, and in doing so, He “washed away” those dirty sins and made me sparkling clean forever! Isaiah 1:18 states, “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” And when Jesus forgives, it’s for all sins, past, present, and future! I am saved forever through Jesus! Now, when God looks at me, He no longer sees a dirty sinful heart. He sees someone who believed in Jesus to save her and chose Christ to be her Saviour! One future day, God will welcome me into His heaven because of my faith in His Son. Psalm 51:10 states, “Create in me a clean heart, O GOD, and renew a right spirit within me.” It is Jesus who makes our hearts clean and right in God’s eyes.
I am so glad my heart is no longer dirty with sin. Jesus “washed away all the filthiness of sin” the moment I asked Him! I now have the assurance that one day, I will live forever with Him in heaven.That is salvation! Jesus has saved me from the punishment of my sins, which is separation from God forever in hell, a place that God actually prepared for Satan and the fallen angels. By accepting Jesus as my Saviour, I am assured of an eternity with Him in His perfect sinless heaven!
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” (1 Peter 1:3-5)
Have you ever asked Jesus to wash away all the dirty sins in your heart? Maybe you’d like to do that now. It’s really simple. All you need to do is understand that you are a sinner and believe that Jesus died on the cross to pay for those sins and rose again to become the Saviour of the world! Then you simply need to ask Him for His forgiveness! That’s it! Jesus promises to save all those who call upon His name! Romans 10:13 states, “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Cleaning up a dirty sinful heart is just a prayer away!
Search me, O God, and know my heart today;
Try me, O Savior, know my thoughts, I pray.
See if there be some wicked way in me;
Cleanse me from ev’ry sin and set me free.
(from “Search Me, O God” by J. Edwin Orr)
“Create in me a clean heart, O GOD, and renew a right spirit within me.” – Psalm 51:10
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If you just asked Jesus to forgive you and save you from the sins of your dirty heart, please let me know! I will pray for you to grow in your new faith and relationship with Him! And I’ll look forward to meeting you in heaven one day!