Dirty or Clean?

When I was a freshman in college I worked as a "slave laborer" for a guy in my church. We installed an in-ground pool in his backyard. It was some of the hardest and dangerous work I have ever done in my life and I got paid $7 an hour. The project was a catastrophe and everything that could have gone wrong went wrong. I will never forget one of the hardest days of work. We had just finished digging the entire ground out for the pool and it measured about 40 feet long, 20 feet wide, and 13 feet deep. It was the middle of the summer, so it was extremely hot and dry. Right after we had finished digging out the pool it started to rain, so we put a huge cover over the hole and finished for the day. The next morning when we went back to work we discovered that the cover over the hole had blown away sometime during the storm and that the hole was filled with muddy water about 2 feet high. Since the water was so muddy we could not pump it out, it had to be hauled out in buckets. That was my job for the day. From 7 am till 7 pm I had to haul out the muddy water in 5 gallon buckets. It was one of the hottest days of the year. I was covered in mud from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. It was in every crevice of my body and since it was so hot the mud dried on my skin and started to layer on me. After we had finished I was so dirty that I could not get into my car or go into my boss' house to shower. So my boss decided to hose me off with water in his front yard as I stood there in my underwear getting squirted with cold water. Finally after alot of the mud came off I went home to shower again because I was not completely clean. I showered for about 30 minutes scrubbing myself with soap and trying to get all the mud off of me. After I had finished I would get out and about 5or 10 minutes later I would discover mud on some part of my body. Either behind my ear, under my knee, inbetween my toes. I showered countless times trying to get completely clean but it was to no avail, I always felt dirty. This is how some of us are with our relationship with the Lord. When we sin we feel dirty and unclean. Sometimes no matter what we do, we just feel spiritual dirty. We try everything to "get clean," we try to act good, we try to pray hard, but we still feel dirty. When this happens we have lost sight of the gospel. Christ has redeemed us and has cleansed us completely of all sin, past, present, and future. Listen to Titus 3:4-5: But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to His own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. And 1 John 1:9: If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Remember that there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. If we are in Christ we are clean. Our eyes need to be on Jesus Christ and His completed work on the cross! That is the only answer for curing a spiritually dirty heart: CHRIST