Don’t you hate it when something red accidentally gets put in with a white load of wash? Grrrrrrr……..
I remember putting one of my green throw rugs in with a load of underwear, t-shirts and socks, all white. I thought that the rug was old enough that it would stop bleeding out color. I was wrong. Poor Blake went around with pale green socks and t-shirts and a look on his face that said, “Really, mom????
In grade school we learned that red and yellow made orange. Blue and yellow made green. Blue and red made purple. And all the primary colors combined made brown.
And from kindergarten and our laundry experiences we know that red and white always make pink.
But what if God, the Master of all colors, mixed it up? What if He did things backwards that don’t fit in the box of our common sense and knowledge?
What if He took something black, poured a bunch of red over and said that His results were white?
That’s just crazy talk!
But that’s exactly what He did. That’s exactly what happened. He took the black of our dirty hearts to the cross where it was covered with His own precious blood and gave us back hearts that were brilliant white.
So often I find myself tripping on the jutted edges my own logic. I compare His ability to clean to something as ridiculous as my laundry. NOTHING, in my experience, gets everything out. There are always residuals of stains – the places where I spilled or fell or brushed past something I shouldn’t have. And those residuals hold reminders. Stains never go completely away.
But He said “white as snow”. Not snow that has been stepped on on driven over or that the dogs have had their way with. Fresh fallen, perfectly white snow. No residual left on that white heart. No reminders. All traces of black GONE.
I have a hard time getting my human mind around that concept. Maybe it’s because it’s nearly impossible for me to see myself in that way. To forgive and forget. But that’s exactly what God says He does. Bright white.
I think I also have a hard time not thinking that there still might be tinges of red – pink edges on my white heart. Places where the blood had to linger and stay because of the stubborn corners of my heart. Those places where the red signifies not just forgiveness, but left over guilt and shame. As if I have to keep asking forgiveness for the same mistake.
But God didn’t say I’ll make your heart the color of a flamingo. He said snow. He said white and He meant white. Even if my mind can’t fathom or make sense of it.
Black and red make white. My head doesn’t get it, but my heart will definitely never get over it…
Isaiah 1:18 – “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”
Isaiah 43:10 – “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.”
Psalm 103:12 – as far as the east is from the west, – so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
Isaiah 43:18 – “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing;”
