Ezekiel 16 Part Five: Cleansed

"Then I bathed you with water, washed off your blood from you and anointed you with oil."
~Ezekiel 16: 9

Proverbs 20:9 asks: “who can say, ‘I have cleansed my heart, I am pure from my sin?’” Though the Old Testament spoke of ceremonial acceptance before God in terms of ‘clean’, or ‘unclean’, few people use the word today. But it resounds with our soul doesn’t it? Sexual abuse victims still speak of this feeling. Social outcasts feel it. Sinners feel it. I never understood suicide until the day I felt unclean in my soul. It seemed to me that there were many ways to radically alter an unbearable life before ending it. But the truth of the matter is just as RW Emerson put it: “What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us.”

Where do you go when your faith, built upon the experiences of your past, is clouded and unsure, like a broke-down city? Where do you go when hope for the future is foolish and it seems like there’s no love or life left in you anymore?

Well, I get in the shower.
And I weep.
Because you can try to change; you can get counseling, memorize scripture, follow all the right steps and every word of advice. But deep inside, there are memories, and there is pain and sin, and you know that your heart is dying. There is nothing you can do to fix it. There is nowhere you can go where the reality of your sin won’t be. You know, I can honestly say that God has never failed to meet me in this place. God is always “near to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit” (Psalm 34:18).

This is the part of the story where God shows up. Let these beautiful words from Titus wash over you like hope that rains down on desperate sinners: “But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior” (Titus 3:4-6). Did you catch the ‘But God’ part? Did you see how He moves towards us out of the wealth of His mercy and love for mankind? Did you pause to take in the fact that when He washes you, you are regenerated and renewed? Regenerated means the contracts you made with the devil not to love again after a betrayal—broken. The root of bitterness you planted that corrupted dozens around you and took over your mind—gone. That sexual addiction you fed— healed. The shame you live with because of sexual abuse—replaced with comfort and joy. It doesn’t always come in a moment. But it comes. And when the kindness of God, your Savior, and His love for you appears, He saves you, washes you, and there is a regeneration and renewal in your heart that is the exclusive work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus is always with you in the moment you realize your soul needs to be cleansed. His heart towards you is undivided: “I am willing;” He said, “be cleansed.”