Sandblasted

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here were seven boys in our neighborhood and we did all the normal things that growing boys do, namely, get into all kinds of mischief.  We all played together well but on occasion we were known to have our differences.  We were also fiercely competitive, always trying to best each other or, at the very least, making sure we were all on equal footing.

When we were very young, this wasn’t a problem. However, as we grew bigger, so did the toys we wanted to play with.  One of these toys was the motorbike.  We all wanted one and after much begging, stubbornness, and wearing down of parents, we all got one.  Mine was orange and had three different gears.  My dad thought the bike was too much for me, but I was determined to have one and I did. 

That bike taught me a great deal about responsibility.  I agreed to purchase the bike and raised money by mowing grass and doing odd jobs.  The payments were $21.63 per month, an amount I found to be astronomical.  However, I did what I could and when I needed help, mom and dad stepped in.  The engine on this bike was a two-stroke engine, meaning I had to mix the gasoline and the oil together in order for the bike to run.  My dad taught me how to do this and each time I needed fuel, I mixed it myself.

Due to the oil being mixed with the gasoline, the engine was very easy to flood.  When this happened, the sparkplug became covered with oil and wouldn’t fire.  Instead of being clean and dry, it was wet and black from the oil that covered it.  The only thing to do at a time like this was purchase a new sparkplug.  This could get fairly expensive and my dad impressed upon me the need to keep the bike in good running order and to avoid flooding the engine.  I did my best, but sometimes I flooded the engine and we had to get new sparkplugs.

That’s when our neighbor, Dennis Beam, became a lifesaver.  Dennis was a welder and he would take my flooded sparkplugs to work and clean them for me.  He used a sandblaster to thou roughly clean the sparkplugs.  When I gave them to him, they were black and messy.  When he returned them to me, they were clean, and looked brand new, as if they had never been used.  Dennis did this for me when I needed it and he never charged me a dime to repair the sparkplugs for my bike.  He did what I was unable to do.  Flooding the sparkplug was no problem, as I proved a number of times; but cleaning it was beyond my knowledge and my ability.  In order for my bike to work, in order for there to be a spark in the engine, the sparkplug had to be in perfect working order.  Dennis made sure that I had what I needed and he was always glad to help me when I needed it most. 

King David would have readily identified with this problem.  In Psalm 51:10, he cries out to God to repair his heart, to clean it up, and repair it.  David was missing the “spark” that causes us to live a life pleasing to God.  His heart was black and messy, covered with sin.  This meant that his witness and his effectiveness were at a complete standstill.  There was no life in his engine, no “spark” in his heart.  No matter what he tried, there was no way David could repair the damage in his life.  He could not buy a new heart and he could not use the old one to please God.  David needed major repairs; he needed to have his heart cleaned.  In short, David needed to be sandblasted, cleaned from all his sin until not one blot or blemish remained in his heart.

David took his problem to God.  He knew that God had the ability, not only to clean his heart, but to return it to the proper condition.  Let’s take a look at his words in this Psalm. “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.”  In this simple, but effective, prayer, David unlocks the secret to maintaining a life that pleases God.  First, David realized his heart was not clean.  His sin with Bathsheba (he committed adultery with her and had her husband killed so they could be together) had taken the spark out of his life. There was no fire in his soul and all attempts to walk before God and be a witness for him had come to a grinding halt.  So David asked for a clean heart, one that would serve God in every way. 

Second, David knew he possessed neither the knowledge nor the ability to correct his problem.  Only God could take David’s heart, sandblast it, clean it up, remove all the sin staining it and preventing it from working properly, and make it right.  Only God could restore David’s heart and put him back in proper working order.  All this, God does for us if we will just ask Him.  And, like Dennis Beam, God never charges us.  He doesn’t like it when we bring dirty hearts and lives to Him, but He loves us so much that He cleans us up and restores us to a right relationship with Him.

All of us have blots and blemishes in our hearts today that keep us from living a life that is pleasing to God.  Our hearts are flooded with sin.  They are black, messy, gooey, and don’t work very well.  In fact, they don’t work at all in this condition.  God is interested in the heart and He wants it to be clean and free from sin and all its influence.  That is why He sent Jesus.  His death on the cross for our sins, meant that our hearts could be clean and restored.  God asks us to come to Him, to bring Him our hearts in whatever condition they happen to be, and to let Him sandblast them for us.  When the process is over, we are clean, restored, and full of fire!  Have you been sandblasted lately?