Not too many people enjoy cleaning. Yet my wife cleans houses for a living. Being unemployed the last several months, I've been helping her when she needs it. While it is a little physically demanding for an aging man like myself, it is doable. But every once in a while we get a "special" job.
Such a job came up last Saturday. A client's father had died and the client had done some refurbishing to the house: new ceiling, carpet, and some other work. But not everything had been cleaned up from the move out. So the job had the worst of both types: move out and new construction.
Like most move outs, we had to clean everything. Vacuum out the drawers and shelves. Since they had installed a new ceiling, a visible layer of dust coated everything. And I mean everything! Small rocks lay on the fireplaces. The freezer needed extensive cleaning. The bathtubs, especially one, had crud that needed scraping out. Fun, fun, fun!
On most of these jobs, I get the floor duty. I'd say about 90% of the house was carpeted, with brand new carpet. Did you catch that? Brand new pile carpet! Do you know what that means? I didn't until I started vacuuming.
You see, new pile carpet isn't dirty. But, it is fuzzy. Extremely fuzzy. We use a bagless canister vacuum (luckily). We would have gone through several bags if we hadn't. For each bedroom, I had to empty the canister at least twice. Full of dirt? No, full of carpet fuzz. I must have emptied it out at least 5 or 6 times in the living room. Lots and lots of carpet fuzz! I never realized that new carpets were so full of loose fuzz.
It took both of us working a full 6.5 hours to clean the house, for a total combined 13 hours of work. We were tired, to say the least. And hungry! We'd hardly eaten more than a 6" sub all day. So eight o'clock at night, we went out to eat before heading home, and refueled. Long Saturday!
He texted my wife today. "Great job! Thanks." Another satisfied customer. Not to mention the pay was good. Now he can show the house and sell it. And we can pay some more bills.
The surprise? I expected to be sore the next day as my back was hurting after we finished. But I felt good. While I can't say, "Oh, I love cleaning houses!" I do feel a sense of satisfaction at a job well done. And the joy of spending the whole day with my wife.
Come to think of it, isn't that our motivation with God? Why we "buffet our bodies" and spend time worshiping Him? Because we love Him, and want to spend time with Him, and He deserves it? I think that is part of letting your light shine so that He may be glorified. Whatever you do, do all for the glory of God. Wise words to keep in mind whether we're cleaning a house, worshiping, or writing a novel.
How do you glorify God in your daily activities?
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