Dexters and Danskos

In previous posts I’ve mentioned that I’m a cheapskate.  I like to say I’m thrifty but….well…we all know the truth.  My wife is also incredibly good at stretching a penny.  We aren’t sure if it’s because we’re from the Northeast (where Yankee virtues include things like self-sufficiency, thrift, etc…) or if we just like to get the best bang for our buck.  Either way, nowhere are these character traits more obvious than in our closet.  Just as an example:  I graduated Barnstable High School in 1994.  During senior week, they gave us all t-shirts.  I still have that t-shirt.  Granted, it looks more like a lace doily than a shirt but if I can still use it than, by golly, I will.

 

  All this came to my attention the other morning when I realized that I couldn’t walk in our “walk-in” closet.  There was stuff everywhere.  A careful analysis of the situation led me to the conclusion that I didn’t have enough hangers.  An even closer analysis led me to the fact that the reason I needed more hangers was because eighty percent of the current ones were being used by clothes I didn’t wear.  Either they were old and holey (not holy), or they were too big (since back in the nineties, the style was baggy pants and oversized flannel…thank you Seattle).  Regardless, most of those clothes hadn’t seen the outside of a closet since we moved to Tennessee six and a half years ago.

 

The other thing taking up space was shoes.  I have a problem with shoes.  Not an Imelda Marcos problem.  Quite the opposite.  I never buy shoes.  I have bad feet so if I find a pair that doesn’t hurt me, I wear them every day, all day, until, like my t-shirts, they look like lace doilies wrapped around my feet.  Brown or black leather doilies but doilies none-the-less.  So, along with the eighty percent of my clothes that I don’t wear, I have several pairs of shoes that I haven’t worn in years haunting my closet floor.  Those old Dexters (remember those, Children of The Eighties?) and that pair of Danskos that used to feel good but are so worn out they hurt now.  All of these things were making the use of my closet impossible.  So….what is the solution?  After a few trips to Goodwill and a trip to the dump, I can actually see the floor again.  Even better, the new clothes I’ve bought can move from the floor to their proper place of honor on a hanger or a shelf.  These new clothes should be honored.  After all, they actually fit me right, and they make me look good.  And when I look into my closet, it doesn’t look full but what is there I use and there is room for more. 

 

I don’t know about you, but as I was cleaning all that old stuff out, I thought about how I deal with my spiritual life.  Much like that closet, I have stuff in there that doesn’t suit me anymore.  It was stuff that I picked up when I wasn’t a Christian, stuff from when I was an immature believer, and some of it was flat out sin.  Most of it started as ways of dealing with the world around me and, in the same way clothing and shoes cover our body, much of it was designed to hide the stuff I didn’t want anyone to see.  And some of it, like my Dexters and Danskos, felt great at first or were in style but now are just taking up room.  In The Book of Hebrews, the author urges us to “…throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”   What I love about that verse is that it specifically mentions two types of things that we need to cast off.  The first are things that may be good but are a hindrance.  These are the clothes that don’t fit or are past their prime and are just taking up space.  These are habits and mannerisms, needless events and business, and anything else that, on their own, aren’t bad but are holding us back from where The Lord is calling us to go.  The other specific thing that the author of Hebrews mentions is sin.  In the closet analogy, I think of my Dexters and Danskos.  They may have started out feeling good but now they don’t just hinder me, they hurt me.  And since I have such bad feet, it wouldn’t be long before I wasn’t just in pain but actually crippled.  Sin won’t just drag you down.  It’ll stop you cold.  So the author of Hebrews urges us to cast those things aside and to run.  As we run God gives us new strength, new life, and new growth.  So besides being able to run, by throwing off these things we now have room for the newness God offers.  We have a race marked out for us.  Custom made to fit us.  And all that newness deserves a place of honor in the closets of out hearts.  Our lives may not look as busy or blessed or as full as someone else’s but what is there suits us.