Completely Clean

“The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!’” John 1:29

Some of the television commercials that caught my eye as a child were those amazing detergent ads. They still follow much the same pattern. You see a pair of white pants smeared with green and brown stains; the kind every kid has after a hard day at play outside. Of course, it never occurred to me back then, “Why did Mom and Dad allow their kid to wear his nice white pants to romp around outside in?” Nonetheless, we see the before; messy, and stained, and then the after; nicely laundered without a trace of the previous stain.

Every sort of impossible blot was used, from wine to ketchup to the ubiquitous “ring around the collar”. Some of the braver ads featured their results against a competitor’s brand. Of course their product cleaned the clothing to perfection with the competition leaving an obvious trace of the stain behind.

It was like magic to me, and I wanted to know how they did it. And, if one detergent could do it that good, why didn’t they all? It just seemed obvious to my young mind that it wasn’t some secret formula because so many brands made the same claims. From “Oh Fab, I’m glad…” to “Tide gets the stains that others leave behind” they made their claims and showed us the results in clear black and white, 1960s antenna TV.

I know my play clothes never looked like the ones on television. The grass stains stayed plainly green on my knees or rear end, depending on what game we had played that afternoon. The remains of grape popsicle could be seen on my t-shirts, and “ring around the collar” hung around my neck from about the third wearing on. I don’t know if Mom and Dad couldn’t afford those brand name, super-duper detergent brands, or whether it was all a scam and no one ever got as clean as the commercials showed. I could have developed quite a complex over it. But Mom did the wash, it was my job to play outside and prep my jeans for the next load.

John the Baptist saw Jesus walking toward him one day while he was baptizing along the Jordan River. Religious experts had been asking John who he was. “Are you a prophet John? Are you the Prophet, the Messiah? Are you the long awaited One?” With every question John would answer a definitive “No,” even going so far to say that when the Messiah came he wouldn’t be worthy to even tie his shoelaces, let alone be called a Prophet.

So, Jesus shows up, the true Messiah, and John cannot contain himself, and cannot escape the chance to finally get rid of the Messiah badge many were trying to place on him. “There He is. Look! There is the Lamb of God who takes away the world’s sins!” No false advertising here. This was the real deal.

The stain of sin runs deep in humanity. We are self-focused creatures who, even in our attempts at doing good, want to take the credit without acknowledging our need for help. Of course, there are exceptions to the rule, but it is fairly clear that something is wrong with the human race. We are warped, we are bent, we have difficulty, even with the evidence plain as day, admitting we need a change.

Just like Uncle Who or Auntie What, suffering from one pain after another, but unwilling to see a doctor, we minimize our need. “It’s just a little thing,” we say, as it takes us all day to finally get moving because our arthritis is so painful. “I don’t need to see a doctor.”

There is One who came to deal with the sickness of humanity. From the beginning, Jesus’ task is clear. He is more than another teacher. He is greater than even the greatest of God’s prophets. He is not even on the same playing field as Moses or Abraham, or leaders of other world religions. He came with a purpose altogether different; to take away the world’s sins!

Once I accepted that and realized how much I needed my personal inner self cleansed and changed, I called out to Him. He was faithful to me, as He has been to all who have come to Him through the centuries, washing my sins away, creating a new person within. Father God no longer sees the stains that were soul-deep. By putting myself in Jesus’ care, I am as pure as He is in God’s sight.

The cross was the ultimate cleanser. As ugly and a bloody mess as the cross was, it is where we were made white as snow. Throughout the centuries Jews had sacrificed lamb after lamb to temporarily purify the people’s sins. But Jesus, the Lamb of God, once and for all, took the shame of it upon Himself, leaving us spotless and clean.

Do not say, “I need to get myself in better shape before I follow Jesus.” That misses the point altogether. He offers full cleansing no matter how nasty we think our own stains may be. Take the offer of forgiveness, and let the stains be whisked away by the immeasurable love of God through Christ. There is nothing better than knowing we have been purified within and stand clean before our Lord.