Something Better (Friday Devotional)

“Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.”

- Philippians 4:8-9

Water jumped over the side of the bucket as I dunked my rag into it with force and more than a little frustration. I silently cursed my carelessness and felt my temper rise. This was getting ridiculous—my knees were aching, my fingers were as wrinkly as raisins, and I couldn’t even tell anymore if the sweat on my brow was from the work or my aggravation.

All I’d wanted to do was clean the kitchen floor, a job long past due but that nevertheless shouldn’t have taken more than half an hour. Yet here I was 45 minutes in, and every time I swiped the wet rag across the kitchen tiles, all I seemed to be doing was drawing new dirty streaks instead of removing old ones. I had soapy water, I had a rag, I had the elbow grease—why wasn’t the floor sparkling yet?

At about the moment I was getting ready to kick the bucket over, Lindsey called to check in on how my day was going. Venting, I explained the predicament: we were just going to have to get used to a perpetually dirty floor, because ours was apparently impossible to clean. With the gentle tone you might adopt when speaking to a lost child, she asked the obvious question: “Honey, have you been using the same water the whole time?”

I looked down at the bucket with fresh eyes and saw what my work’s progression had blinded me to—the water was a filthy brownish-gray color, the soapy bubbles long gone. For at least ten minutes, I’d been trying to wash a dirty floor with dirty water. It was time for something better.

Sometimes the world seems to be as dark and grimy as that water. All the news seems to be bad news, every conflict seems to be a crisis, and hope is a forgotten friend. The Fall seems much nearer than Christ’s return, sin more triumphant than grace. You find yourself wanting to replace the constant barrage of decadence, disappointment, and depravity with something better.

In the conclusion to his letter to the church in Philippi, the apostle Paul directs believers to do just that, to dwell not on the sinfulness the world bombards us with, but on what is true, honorable, just, pure, pleasing, commendable, excellent, and praiseworthy—in other words, what is Christ-like. This is not a Pollyannaish plea to “be positive,” but a more serious command to be redemptive, to replace the broken things of our world with the wholeness of heaven. Rather than being preoccupied with the world’s problems and sinking into despair, the gospel calls believers to rise with Christ and serve as lights to the world.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Put less poetically, you can’t wash a dirty floor with dirty water. As believers, we are called to respond to sin not with more sin, but with the power and grace of the gospel. So when the world seems like it can’t get any darker, may you respond neither with retreat nor retaliation, but redemption.