The window is long and looks into the living room of Lori's ranch house.
I smile as I wipe away the wet with a dry towel and gaze through the clear, clear glass.
It's crystal, sparkling in the sunshine.
I stand back, surveying the beauty of it.
I push it back into place and wipe over it once more. Smiling at my smile inside the glass.
Then I move on to the next, carrying the bucket of dirty water with me.
It's satisfying. Seeing I've wiped away all that flithy-ness. Made the glass pretty again.
The morning air blows cold around my face. The sun hides behind a blanket of gray. My fingers tingle. But I find myself in the window I just washed. My smile fades. I missed a spot. It wasn't there before. I stand in front of the window again and I can't see the spot any more. I wipe over the pane. I step to the side. It's still there.
But I can only see it from the side. I frown and scrub at the spot.
It wasn't there before. Why didn't see it? How was it so easy to miss? I scrub harder on the spot, using my fingers inside the cloth.
I go back to the other window and finish washing, making doubly sure there are no spots left over.
I wipe it clean and then go onto the next.
But low and behold, I look at my reflection and still see spots.
Shaking my head, I return and look at them sideways, finding they turn invisible if I look straight through the glass.
I wash it again. I move on.
I wash the last window in the enclosed porch. Before I close it back up, I step to the side, looking for spots. And there they are.
It's like a beam in my eye. A big spot all over me, so big I can't see how big it really is. I'm ugly in places I can't even see and I point out how dirty everyone else is.
It's only when He moves me to the side, away from my reflection, that I see the ugliness. See how dirty I really am, even though I look clean to me. And then I can't look. I can't bare to admit it. I wipe at the spots, at the glass of my soul, scrubbing and scrubbing. Trying to hide it from Him.
But I'm not like the windows. I can't scrub away the dirty spots that no one sees. I cover them up. I wash, and wash, and wash. But I step to the side again. They're still there, the water rolling off them, leaving no lines, no smearing. As I wash they grow. Breeding others, splotching my soul. Black bleeding spots, where there's no end to the stream of dark puss that bubbles and spills over, burning inside my chest. I can't make them pretty again.
I hide them away. Hoping no one will find them out. I paint them with golden hues, pink, white. It stays for a little while. But it's not satisfying. It's not clear. It's not crystal.
It's only pure when there's nothing underneath. When there's nothing mixed in with it.
Even if there's just one spot on my soul, I'm all dirty.
But when I loose the rag to wash with, and the paint cracks and peels, puss seeping out . . . when the rain comes and the wind blows dirt into my eyes, when mud cakes around the corners of my soul and I can't see anything but the good I am not, when I feel so ashamed of my dirt, my ugliness, then---THEN He comes, when I've lost all other means of surviving without Him.
He rips His spotless, clean garment from His body. He pierces His hand, then the other, His feet. His forehead. Blood gushes from the holes in His skin, running in red streams from His fingers, dripping over His eyes, off His cheek, pooling at His feet. He rises. Hurting, limping, His hands shaking. He dips His white garment into the pool of blood . . .
Today He washes windows. My window. He wrings out the cloth and rubs it over me. Leaving spotted trails of blood.
My window is long and looks into the Temple of God.
He smiles as He wipes away the black puss with a dry towel and gazes through the clear, clear glass.
It's crystal, sparkling in the sunshine.
He stands back, surveying the beauty of it all, of His handiwork.
He takes my hand and sets me in my place, wiping over me once more. The Finish. Smiling at His smile inside the glass, Him inside of me . . .
It's satisfying. Complete.
Seeing He has wiped away all the flithy-ness.
Seeing He still loves me.
Seeing how much He wanted to make me pretty for Him, not me.
Seeing how He did . . .
I stand up. The burning gone. The guilt gone. Forgiveness steeping in my soul. It will dry, leaving me white. No more paint that cracks and peels away. No more hiding from Him, feeling lost. No more trying and failing to make myself clean.
I take a big, deep breath of the clean, clean wind. I fill up with sunshine.
No more remembering I've got spots when I long to be clean like Him. He's washed my window.
And He didn't leave any spots. I don't need to step to the side. I don't need to make sure.
I close up the window. I switch the locks and stand back. I smile. I whisper, "Thank You, Jesus."
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