Green and Gooey!
I hoped he wasn’t hurt! I had just watched the teen jump off the diving board and then I watched the diving board break and fall on him. That was the end of that fun!
While we were waiting for a repair man to come, we put a very large flower pot at end of the board to remind our children that the board was broken. (I don’t know whose wise idea that was; probably mine!). One morning, I just got home from running and thought I had better put some chemicals (which we call shock) in the pool before I forgot. I grabbed the pail and began to walk around the pool sprinkling the chemicals as I went. (Oh, I forgot to mention that as I was putting these chemicals in the pool, I was speaking to the repair man who had just arrived.) Chatting and tossing and very distracted, I made my way around the pool. As I came to the diving board, I stepped on it! Suddenly, I found myself flying through the air; making a graceful cannon ball fully clothed along with the diving board, the chemical pail and the large (and soon to be broken) flower pot! Try to picture me pulling myself out of the deep end – tennis shoes and all, hauling a chemical pail and large pieces of broken pottery! (The diving board had to wait for my husband to come home!) I was so embarrassed in front of the repair man! I looked and felt ridiculous!
Now potting soil and pool water were not created to be mixed together. The very thing I had tried to avoid, the pool turning green, was now eminent. The bacteria in the water mixed with the potting soil and we had a pond instead of a pool by dinner time! You should see the pictures from my son’s 12th birthday party! It looks like he had it at the black lagoon! It’s a good thing 12 year old boys think that is cool and not gross!
To keep my pool clean and clear, it really isn’t all that difficult, although in the 12 years we have lived here I have never gone a summer yet without turning my pool green!. I have to check my water regularly and put in my chemicals consistently. I have to keep out things that don’t belong in it like potting soil.
It is when I let my guard down that I usually loose it. Late last fall, I thought “It is starting to cool off a bit. I don’t think we need as much shock.” So, I didn’t check the content of our water. I assumed that since the water was looking clear, all was good. My husband even said, “Lynn, it looks like the water is clouding up. Have you checked the chemicals lately?” “It’s all good.” I assured him. Guess what I had to do the following weekend? Spend over five hours vacuuming that pool to get all of the green stuff off of the floor! This time, my husband let me do! (For 12 years he had been cleaning up my messies. I guess it was time I cleaned up my own!) I am sure he was thinking, “If she has to clean it up, maybe next time she’ll stay on top of it!”
Yesterday in my time with Jesus I read 2 Timothy 1:14 “Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you — guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.” To guard means to keep safe from harm or danger, to protect or watch over, to keep under control or misconduct, to position oneself in some sport so as to obstruct or impede movement or progress of an opponent or offense.
We have been given the good deposit of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 1:22, 2 Cor. 5:5) into our hearts. We need to be on guard; protecting, watching over, and obstructing the enemy, Satan, from any position he would want to have. Like my swimming pool, we need to keep what belongs in the pool in and what doesn’t belong in the pool out! That is how we can maintain a clean heart!
Do you have some things this morning that have slipped into your heart that you need to be deliberate about removing? Maybe it hasn’t been so much what you need to take out that is the problem, but what you haven’t been putting in? Just like my pool regularly (not whenever I feel like) needs to have chemicals put in to be clean and clear, so our hearts need His Word and truth put in so that they too will be clean and clear.
As you go into this weekend, carve out some time to do some heart maintenance. Ask the Lord what needs to go in and what needs to come out. He’ll show you; He wants your heart where it should be even more than you do!
How are you spending your weekend? The Cowell Family has a sports filled one! Rugby tonight; softball tournament all day tomorrow. Enjoy your’s!
It is prayer that the Father is asking of me…and so I pray!!
Great Post Lynn!! Keep on that Pool stuff :0)
hahaha! This made me laugh out loud Lynn! What a funny story, but super how you used it to make a point about cleaning out our own hearts! Loved it. Great post friend. 🙂