VIEW FROM A PEW – more to clean than can ever be cleaned

from Sue Robbins

The Lenten season continues at our church — forty days (and forty nights) of  “quiet time” when we think deeply about our lives and try to clean out the junk in preparation for our high holy day, Easter Sunday. 

 A number of us hail from the earth’s northern climes, where Lent coincides with the coming of spring and spring cleaning.  This creates an interesting parallel:  at the same time that we are sweeping our homes and our yards clean of dead leaves and winter’s muddy mess, our faith is calling us to sweep away the clutter in our lives. 

 Along those lines, our church’s “2011 Lenten Discipline” has included a giant clean-out of the spaces and closets in our century-old church building.  In the act of doing this every Saturday for the last four weeks, we have stumbled on the great paradox of large buildings (and large souls):  the more we do, the more that needs to be done.

Case in point:  last year, we painted the whole lower level of our building.  (You really should paint every fifteen years, whether it needs it or not.)  The paint job is absolutely beautiful…except then we really noticed the dingy and stained tiles in the acoustic ceiling.  So this week we’re replacing the ceiling tiles and painting the aluminum structure that supports them.  One of our families– inspired by the paint job and the new ceiling tiles– donated five beautiful ceiling fans, and we called in the electrician to give us the estimate for the fans' installation.  The electrician took one look at our ancient wiring and, well… You get the idea;  it’s endless. 

In his theme song from The Lion King, Elton John writes:  “There’s far too much to take in here,” “more to do than can ever be done.”  Plumbing the depths and cleaning away the debris in one’s soul is at least as daunting as cleaning out an old building.  It is never-ending work best done within a loving community of similarly courageous and curious souls, folk who aren’t afraid of what they find when dingy old tiles are pulled down.  This Lenten season we are reminded of the importance of having good friends down on the floor holding your ladder, praying for you – and keeping a garbage bag handy to catch the dust bunnies and wild animals.  

They are back there — you can hear them — hiding behind the wiring.