Scrubbing Away the Sin that Clings

Aloha is one of my favorite things about living in Hawaii. One way to show aloha is to greet with a hug and kiss on the cheek when you see someone you know or are just meeting.

 

Scrubbing Away a Scent

 

People’s scents don’t often transfer to me at church and linger, but as I drove home from church on Sunday, I realized some had. My husband Anthony is ultra-sensitive to smells. He’d gotten home before me and as I walked into the house and entered the room he was in (he was sitting on the other side of the room), Anthony asked, “What is that smell?”

 

“Church,” I responded. From the look on his face, I knew we couldn’t exist in the same room. So I went immediately to the bathroom to wash off my cheeks and neck and change into a comfy dress.

 

I returned and said, “Better?”

 

He replied that the smell was fainter, but still too strong.

 

I went back to the bathroom. I took off my glasses before scrubbing my whole face and neck.

 

When I returned, he looked so apologetic and said it was still so strong. I made him smell me to figure out what spot I’d missed. I washed my earrings. I washed my glasses. We couldn’t spot the smell’s origin. Then, we found it coating my hair!

 

I jumped into the shower, thinking that would solve everything. I washed myself and threw my comfy dress back on and went back into the living room. We still kept getting snatches of it on the air. How was that possible? Apparently, it had transferred onto my comfy dress.

 

Back to the bedroom I went and found something else to wear. I couldn’t believe how pungent the shoulder of my dress was. My hair and neck must have just been drenched to have transferred that much fragrance onto a secondary article of clothing.

 

Even though I had thoroughly washed my hair, when my hair blew across my face, I got a whiff of the fragrance. I couldn’t believe how the smell totally clung to me, though I did my best to rid myself of it!

 

Despite the random residual scent, finally, Anthony could be in the same room as me. Balance restored.

 

Sin Clings to Us Just Like the Scent Clung to Me

 

My friend Rachel asked me to speak at her baptism later that day so the baptismal covenant had been on my mind. While in the shower scrubbing the scent off of me, I realized I’d just lived a great metaphor for repentance.

 

When I do wrong, I scrub what I think is affected and then think I’m OK.

 

But if I ask the Lord if I’m truly clean enough to be in His presence, it may take a couple of scrubbings before spiritual balance is restored. To be changed and clean before the Lord is the purpose of repentance so that I can stand spotlessly and confidently in the heavenly presence of the Lord.

 

And no unclean thing can enter into his kingdom; therefore nothing entereth into his rest save it be those who have washed their garments in my blood, because of their faith, and the repentance of all their sins, and their faithfulness unto the end.

Now this is the commandment: Repent, all ye ends of the earth, and come unto me and be baptized in my name, that ye may be sanctified by the reception of the Holy Ghost, that ye may stand spotless before me at the last day.