Dirty Towels

I am particular about my towels. Perhaps my family would even call me a bit compulsive about it.  Not only do they have to be washed, but they also have to look and smell clean.  My husband has come to realize I have a very keen sense of smell.  He probably doesn't know (until now) that I smell the towels to determine if they smell clean enough to be considered clean.

I like to fold my towels (a certain way of course) as soon as they are through drying.  Others in my family, who shall go nameless, prefer to put the newly dried towels on top of the dryer until all the laundry is finished and then fold them.  This increases the chances a freshly laundered towel will fall to the floor.

I know it may seem unreasonable, but to me, a towel -- no matter how clean it is at the time-- that has fallen to the floor is now considered dirty.

I thought of this the other day when I heard a preacher speak on our righteousness -- our own attempts to be "good enough" to please God -- are as filthy rags in His sight.

"But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away."  (Isaiah 64:6.)

There is nothing we can do that is good enough to earn God's acceptance.  Not in our salvation, or in the walking of the Christian life.  We must depend entirely upon His righteousness, His strength, His power in and through us.  As the Lord Jesus said,

"When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am He, and that I do nothing of Myself; but as my Father hath taught Me, I speak these things." (John 8:28.)

If the perfect Lord Jesus depended totally upon His Father to walk His earthly life, how much more must we depend totally upon Him to walk ours.  We must never try to en robe ourselves with "filthy rags."

"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; 

yet not I, but Christ liveth in me:  

and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, 

who loved me and gave Himself for me." 

Galatians 2:20