Learn from my Wrinkled Shirts
Well, it happened again this morning. I went into my closet, as I was getting ready to go to work, and I looked for a clean shirt. I had no problem finding a clean shirt, there were about 20 clean shirts hanging on the hangers. No, I’m happy to say that cleanliness was not the problem with me finding a shirt acceptable to wear into the office. The problem was that there were no clean shirts that were ironed. As a matter of fact, I think that each shirt was exhibiting it’s maximum number of wrinkles per square inch. It was remarkable just how un-ironed those shirts were.
You need to know something about my life. Before Beverlie and I had children, my shirts were always ironed. Immaculately … well, fairly immaculately anyway. I remember coming home from my mid-week church services, back when I had a junior high, senior high and college and career service each week, and finding my lovely wife ironing my shirts and pants as she watched early seasons of Law and Order, and Biography on television. And then came Thaddeus and Meredith, my two children. Apparently the additional work created by two toddlers made ironing an impossible addition to my wife’s growing list of “to do,” and the ironing was shifted from her list to mine. I guess that by bringing two children into the world, Beverlie felt like it was an acceptable tradeoff, and I can’t say that I disagree. So if something is REALLY wrinkled, I will iron it myself, or wear a sweater over it. If it’s not too bad I have found that the clothes dryer is an incredible wrinkle remover, and as long as you reach into the dryer while the shirt is still tumbling around, and put it on while it’s still boiling hot, you will reduce most of the wrinkles. You can thank me later for that tip.
Back to this morning. As I quickly, and to the best of my ability, ironed my shirt, I got thinking about how life is sometimes an awful lot like my shirt. You may be doing your best to live a clean life – just like my shirt was totally clean – but that doesn’t guarantee that things will go smoothly. Wrinkles can still develop in our life, even when we’re doing our best to be followers of Christ. In fact, Matthew 6:34 tells us that each day will have trouble – there will be wrinkles that will come into our lives no matter how much we try to avoid them. Here’s another analogy to the ironing of the shirt: how do you get the wrinkles out of your shirt? You turn up the heat on the iron, and you apply the HOT iron to your shirt, and you apply great pressure to the shirt, and the heat, together with the steam and the pressure all act together to get rid of the wrinkles. Friends, in each of our lives, when we’re facing wrinkles that we didn’t anticipate, the only way for God to remove them is for Him to turn the heat up on our lives, and for pressure to be applied. It is pretty easy to decide to pack life in when the pressure builds like that, but I guarantee that this is not the correct response. If we stopped applying the iron to a wrinkled shirt because it was too hot, we would never be able to wear those clothes again. Similarly, if we refuse to allow God to apply His pressure to our lives – if we try and walk away from His heat we will never develop into the person that God has in mind for us to be.
So there will be times when we have to make a decision. Will we just try and cover up the wrinkles, spiritually, in our lives, or will we take the mature step to allow God to partner with us to change us? It is not always an easy process, but God’s promise in 1 Corinthians 10:13 is that God will not allow us to be tempted or tried beyond what we can bear. I have two recommendations for you. First of all, buy wrinkle free shirts – for a few extra dollars, it saves a lot of hassle down the road. And secondly, and more importantly, let God get rid of your wrinkles. You will face some opposition and some pressure, but in the end your spiritual clothes will be without spot or wrinkle.
Pastor John