What I Learned About Cleanliness from a 2-Year-Old

Child development experts pretty much all agree that repetition and routine are key for helping a child thrive. This has played out for our kids pretty much from day one. If their routine is disturbed, they’re insane. If we keep the rhythm they’re used to and their development dictates, they’re, well, slightly less insane. Every little bit counts.

The impact of routine has been on display in a really interesting way with Lincoln over the last few months. We have our bedtime routine, including a bath, teeth brushed, pajamas on, etc. But lately, he's taken to a new habit: he must clean his room and the area outside of his room every night before he goes to sleep.

Now, we didn't force this on him or anything, one day he just started doing it. And he doesn't skip a beat: he has to organize his nightstand, make sure the closet doors are closed, make sure no toys are on the floor, the works. He's not particularly organized, he usually just ends up throwing his toys on the floor in the living room. But the kid wants a clean area around him while he sleeps.

The more this behavior became a habit, the more it started to make a real impression on me. I was reminded of verses like Psalm 51:10, "create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me,” or 1 John 1:9, “if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."

Do we make a habit of daily cleaning of ourselves before we go to bed? And I don't mean physically (though showers are encouraged). I mean, do we make sure our immediate area is clean, so that we can sleep with a pure heart? I know I'm not in that habit as often as I should be. How about you?

Jesus talks about this idea of cleanliness right before the Last Supper in John 13. It's that scene where Jesus surprises the disciples by bowing to wash their feet. Peter, ever the vocal one, stands and proclaims, "you shall never wash my feet." This becomes a great teaching moment for Jesus.

You see, the disciples saw this as humiliation for Jesus. All they saw was the physical filth. As usual, they had a hard time looking past the material into the spiritual. Though Jesus was washing their physical feet (as an act of servant leadership and humility unlike any the world has seen), He was really pointing to a practice of the soul. He answers Peter in verse 8 by saying, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.”

If we’re not clean, we have no fellowship with Jesus? Yikes. The first assumption might be to think this is talking about salvation, but Jesus went ahead and put that idea to rest as well just a couple verses later. “the one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean"

Once you've experienced salvation in Christ—that is the bathing of your spiritual self—you are made clean. Nothing can take that away. But there is another type of cleansing we must observe. Let's take a look at the history and context here.

The Jewish people were among the most hygienic cultures in antiquity. They bathed regularly and made a habit of cleanliness. But as they went about their day, walking through the filthy streets in sandals, their feet would get pretty gross. So the practice of foot-washing was normalized in the culture. And of course the people didn’t always need to completely bathe when a simple foot washing would do.

So Jesus is giving the disciples confidence in that they have bathed in the redemptive waters of salvation through Christ, but their intimacy with Him can be challenged by the daily muck of life—unless they allow themselves to be cleaned.

With this foot-washing, Jesus is telling the disciples (and all of us) that though our salvation is sure, our relationship and fellowship with Jesus is hindered by our everyday sin. In order to preserve our fellowship, we must daily cleanse ourselves from the sin in our life.

Are you feeling distant from God? Confess your sins and ask forgiveness. Are you feeling stuck in your faith? Approach the throne and allow yourself to be washed. There are a handful of different things that can cause distance between the believer and God, but chief among them is unconfessed sin (and the reality is that all the other things are probably rooted in unconfessed sin, anyway).

My goal is to be more like Lincoln. Besides being generally lovable and happy (admirable traits for anyone to aspire to) he takes time every single night to clean his surroundings before he goes to sleep. He’s unable to rest and settle down without this cleaning routine. He’s two years old and probably has no idea why he does this, but there’s a valuable lesson for me: I need to spend time every single night in the cleansing waters of prayer, confessing my sin before God and giving it all to Him.

May I be entirely unable to rest and settle my spirit unless I’ve exercised 1 John 1:9 each and every day! May I be dissatisfied with anything less than cleanliness—unable to sleep unless it’s dealt with. I should be so utterly disturbed by the unconfessed sin in my life that I simply must approach the throne and confess it to the Father before I can even entertain the idea of sleep. And if I’m too tired to care, maybe it’s time to repent of my busyness or repent of filling too much of my time with mundane things, and not spending enough time in prayer or personal confession.

I knew being a dad would be challenging, but I never imagined I’d be challenged in this way. My kids are already teaching me lessons about my relationship with God that I might never have learned without them.

So this is my challenge for you: spend time every day before you sleep cleaning your surroundings. Confess your sins—don’t sleep on them. And see if your relationship with God doesn’t blossom in a new and exciting way.