House Cleaning for Pesach

This year, the intense cleaning was much more spiritual than usual.  Interestingly, it was the carpet cleaning and bookshelves that really hit home!  Draperies with a few cobwebs are par for the course, but this year something really hit me.  Mirrors, bookshelves, and carpets really reflect how dirt slowly settles in without notice.  Sins of omission can be the same way.

A mirror behind a ceiling fan on a vaulted living room ceiling looks nice in a picture, but in real life it involves regular attention to actually maintain that pristine image.  By regular, I mean . . . well more frequently than I do it.  The deal about this fan with a mirror behind it, is the mirror offers a clear reflection of the dusty fan blades.  I will admit, the fan blades are dusted more frequently than the mirror is cleaned, but through the big official cleaning for Passover, the evidence is obvious that my regular house cleaning schedule is inadequate.

The bedrooms and bathrooms aren't overwhelming for two reasons.  One, they are maintained regularly and as for guest rooms, nobody messes them up.  They are prepared for guests and picked back up after guests.  No everyday living goes on in the guest rooms.  Second, bedrooms and bathrooms are just a matter of regular housework, so washing curtains and windows is just not that big of a deal.  It's the living room, kitchen, and dining room that take the effort.  The rooms where most of the "living" and activity take place tend to collect the most unnoticed dirt and/or clutter.

Once I conquered the ceiling fan and mirrors, I moved on to the bookshelves and carpets.  The carpet and bookshelves are where I really began to sense a spiritual urgency and revelation.  I vacuum weekly and for the most part finish the projects I begin, or at least keep the perpetual ones gathered together.  The carpets and bookshelves reflected my spiritual journey and heart.  It's so easy to go through the motions, even proper motions, while the deeper issues go untouched.

As I shampooed the carpets, I of course didn't notice any major change in the color of the carpet.  The evidence was in the water I poured out after cleaning.  As I poured that water out, I thought of just how much cleaning Abba has done in my life, that really on the surface, didn't look so bad.  I thought of attending weekly services, just like I weekly vacuumed, and how many of us count on that to keep us walking in holiness.  As I would take breaks between shampooing and other cleaning chores, I dusted.  Due diligence is definitely lacking in my dusting schedule, but that also reflected the need for discipline in my spiritual walk.  It's easy to tell myself I recently dusted, or this isn't "my day to dust," and then just go right on ignoring the dust as it settles everywhere!

I realized, confessed, and hopefully will really repent of being so busy on big projects, I let the small things go unnoticed.  I wondered how many things I just choose to not make a priority that Abba considers important.  This year's house cleaning for Pesach really launched a deeper thinking about my day to day spiritual walk.  I don't want my spiritual life to look like my carpet and my bookshelves, nor can it be secluded like a guest room.  A set apart life has wear and tear and traffic while remaining set apart!