Clutter

     The middle of the night recently brought an 'emergency' email.  When I checked my phone and saw that my husband's email account had some changes made to it and I had gotten the alert, I became just a bit alarmed.  With all the hacking and hijacking and such that people do with email accounts, I was a bit concerned.  After sending a text to my on-duty firefighter husband, I went back to sleep.  The next morning he put my concerns to rest.  Because his email account had over 5000 emails, it wouldn't receive any more emails and he had to make some changes.
     When he called to tell me what was going on, he said "I didn't know you could get too many emails."  Well I didn't either.  But this gave me another thought.  About clutter.  All it would have taken would have been for him to delete the email as he read them and this wouldn't have happened.  I mean, why on earth would you need over 5000 email?
     While I believe my husband's email account issues were really more about a man who just didn't think dealing with emails was important, there is a bigger lesson here.  What clutter do we have in our lives that doesn't belong?  What needs to be deleted so that God can work in our lives?  These are the things that came to mind.
     Pride.  We all seem to have it even though we pretend we don't.  We hide behind it.  We hold it up in front of us to protect us.  We hurt others to spare our own pride.  Proverbs 11:2 says "When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom."  Seems pride keeps us from wisdom.  Psalm 10:4 reads "In his pride the wicked man does not seek him; in all his thoughts there is no room for God." We ALL need God in our lives.  Pride can keep us from Him.  So let's delete pride.
     Hypocrisy.  Wow.  Ironically we tend to see the hypocrisy in the lives of others but not in our own lives.  I John 2:4 tells us that "whoever says "I know Him" but does not keep His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him."  So......if we don't keep God's commandments we are hypocrites.  There are quite a few commands to keep....Don't lie, don't steal, don't commit adultery, love your neighbor as yourself, just to name a few.  If we don't keep even one of these commands but say we love the Lord, we are hypocrites. So let's delete hypocrisy.
     Lying and gossip.  Hmmm... James chapter 3 speaks to the fact that the tongue is small but, like a ship's rudder that steers the ship, our tongues take us places where we often regret going.  While the tongue is small, it holds a lot of power.  Saying something we shouldn't say can hurt someone just a little bit or absolutely destroy someone.  Let's delete lying and gossip and use the tongue to praise the Lord instead.
     This could go on and on and on.  But I think we all kinda get the picture.  When our lives are cluttered with Pride, hypocrisy, lying, adultery, etc, there is no room for new thoughts, new ideas, a renewed relationship with the Lord.  What are you waiting for?  The longer you put it off, the more cluttered your life becomes and the more difficult it is for you to actually see God,. seek God, know God.
     How about this.....we ask God to remove our pride and hypocrisy.  We stop lying and gossiping.  We allow God to bless us and fill us back up the right way instead of the vile and disgusting way.  He wants you to be close to Him.  What do you need to delete to draw near to Him?  Are you willing or does pride win out?  It's time to de-clutter and make room for the Lord.  Do yo know Him?  Would you like to?