Have you ever looked at your life and wished you had done things differently? Maybe you had had a chance when you were young to have made better choices, but you ignored that niggling voice. I can tell you I have been there too…
I looked in the mirror, and to my horror, my teeth had cavities between the three last teeth at the back of my mouth on the top and bottom. That would have been twelve cavities. Vance and I were on vacation a couple of years ago Miami in, and I had seen the mirror attached to the wall that extended out on the arm.
I decided to view my side profile and see how I looked. I smiled. Then I saw it, a black mark between my teeth. I looked again. More black between more teeth. I came out of the bathroom devastated. How was this possible the dentist had spent a year trying to keep up with the massive amount of cavities I was accumulating and had just finished repairing my pearly whites?
Usually, at home, I whizzed through my morning routine in about ten minutes. There was no time to pamper myself or really take a good look in the mirror. Now I wished I hadn’t been so vain. My vacation was ruined.
I hoped on the bed beside Vance who was reading a book and asked him to look at my teeth. He checked them over and said, “Yes you have cavities.” I wanted to cry.
After our holiday I was back in the dentist office. When he was done examining my mouth, he sat me up and said, “Those aren’t cavities, they are stains, but I’m not sure what from.” I was flabbergasted. Could a person have more bad luck with teeth than me? I don’t actually believe in bad luck, but at the moment that is how I felt.
I went home and started praying. I have learned this is one of the best ways to get a solution to a problem.
A few days later I was searching the internet for answers to my stained teeth. I happen to come upon an article that said liquid iron supplements or chewable iron can stain your teeth black. I had been consuming chewable iron tablets for a few months since my doctor said my iron was low.
The solution: baking soda. (click here to learn more: benefits of brushing with baking soda)
Sounds too simple, doesn’t it? But it was the right answer for my exact problem. Within a couple of weeks, all the black stains were gone from my teeth. By my next appointment, my dentist was quite impressed that I had come up with a solution to my problem.
How about you do you need a trip to the spiritual dentist? Do you have sins in your life that are staining your life and you need Jesus to clean them up? Or maybe you are the opposite your always pointing out everyone else’s black marks but don’t see your own.
‘Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. -Matthew 7:3-5
Vance was telling me a story he read about:
A church decided to do outreach in its neighbourhood and community. It went so well that their pews were full the next Sunday…with prostitutes.
But with the newcomers arose a problem amongst the elderly in their church. The older folks were offended by the lack of clothing the new ladies wore to Sunday services. They went to the elders and said that the leaders needed to inform the ladies to dress more appropriately. The elders gave this some thought, and a new problem arose.
The prostitutes were poor, and the only clothing they had was for their work. They couldn’t afford to buy modest clothing. The leaders of the church didn’t want to talk to the ladies because there wasn’t much the women could do to change their own situation. Plus they wanted the women to stay so they could learn about the love of God.
The people who complained left the church to never come back. The prostitutes eventually gave their lives over to Christ, and God convicted them on their own to change their clothing to more appropriate attire for church. God cleaned them up, not the elderly or the leaders.
I have learned personally that the Holy Spirit is quite good at convicting me without the help of other people. But sometimes it comes at a cost. If we are being convicted and know God wants to rid something out of our life that is hurting us or others, and we ignore him, that voice slowly gets quieter and quieter till we are swallowed by our own sin.
Being sensitive to God’s leading and direction is crucial in a Christian’s life to keep us on the path God has planned for us. You know that little nagging feeling in your chest you feel when you know you shouldn’t be doing something, but you don’t listen because it seems so enticing.
When I was a teenager, a friend and me, I will call her Beth, started hanging out with a couple of young men. I knew I shouldn’t have been doing it and God kept whispering to me, but I kept pushing him away. My mom was gone for two weeks to Toronto, and I was supposed to stay with another family, but I begged mom to let me stay at home with a friend. So Beth came and hung out with me while mom was gone.
We lived in a duplex, and an older couple occupied the other apartment. Mom asked them to keep an eye on us. We wanted to hang out with the two young men one night, so Beth and I snuck out of the house at 2 am, put our tiny car in neutral and pushed it out of the driveway, and around the corner, then hopped in and drove off.
We stayed out all night driving around Wawa and the surrounding area with these two young men, and I had that tight feeling in my chest the whole evening. I knew what I was doing was wrong. I had dishonoured my mother and disobeyed her.
But sin is so tempting and at times can appear fun. But it left a mark on me after that like the black stains on my teeth. I ended up dating one of the young men for two weeks, and it was the worse two weeks of my teenage years. My self-esteem dropped about ten notches, and I always wished I had listened to the Holy Spirit when he was trying to help me.
We can tend to see God as a balloon deflator, someone who doesn’t want us to have fun. But when you think about the ten commandments in a different light, you will see he is a protector and joy giver, not a fun-killer.
I had disobeyed my Moms wishes by stealing the car and staying out all night. I also had brought shame to my family name by appearing to be a girl with loose morals.
God set up the ten commandments to bring us happiness and to bring others peace. He knew if the world followed these ten pieces of wise advice we would have world peace, no divorce, no abortion, no stealing…etc.
Imagine living in a world where you never locked your doors since there would be no killing or stealing. Yet people laugh at the thought of obeying God and following his principals.
Eventually, God got a hold of my foolish, rebellious heart and led me to my wonderful husband Vance and I am now happily married and delighted God steered me away from destroying my life.
Back when I was in my rebellion as a teenager, God never let my sin feel right, he always allowed me to feel a heaviness that would bring me back to him over and over again.
Our lives can be filled with sin. Some of us so much so we can’t see over our pile of crimes since it is so enormous and been collected over many years.
I am surrounded by many troubles—
too many to count!
My sins have caught up with me,
and I can no longer see;
they are more than the hairs of my head,
and I have lost my courage.
Save me, Lord! Help me now! – Psalms 40:12-13
But God being the loving and beautiful God that he is doesn’t want to leave you this way. He has a strong desire to take those stains like I had on my teeth, and wash them away till you feel pearly white.
Jesus is the baking soda that rids the sins in our life. But you might be saying, “I have done the most wicked things to ever be forgiven.” Jesus died for every human and for every sin. No sin is too high that the power of his blood shed on the cross couldn’t cover. All Jesus wants from you: that you ask for his forgiveness and give your life over to him.
Have you grown tired and weary of the sin surrounding you and all the grief it is causing you? Today is the day you can have a new life. One free from stealing, drinking, drugs, prostitution, murder, rape, adultery, pornography…Jesus will be the one to rid these joy-killers from your life. Ask him today to forgive you, he always says yes.
There is a new life waiting for you…you just need to step out in faith💗
I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 6: 19-23
