Romans 7:24 “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death?”
STINKY
I remember growing up in South Georgia and working for Mr. Pollock. He owned a variety of businesses, one of which was a Grain Bin Operation. He would buy the farmers’ corn once it was harvested and load it into large metal silos which in turn would be augered into waiting train cars. Grain in – Grain out. Unless….
One day someone, while checking the level of the grain in the bin, left the top door open. Well, it rained and the grain inside, which was down pretty low, got soaked. Inside that grain bin the temperature would rise to well over 115 degrees so that corn just fermented. I was one of the lucky ones who got sent into that grain bin to shovel that rotten, smelly, wretched corn into the auger so it could be cleaned.
I can’t begin to tell you how bad the smell was. You may have heard the expression “It would gag a maggot.” Well…it was worse than that. Needless to say, when we emerged out of that grain bin we smelled wretched. When I see that word I think of that smell. That’s how our sin smells.
TEACHING MOMENT
The next time your child gets real “stinky” why not talk about how our sin smells to God. That aroma is NOT sweet. After you give them a bath and they smell “sweet” again, talk about how once we confess our sins we have a sweet aroma to God. What a perfect example of our sin and forgiveness. Stinky to sweet! Wretchedness to holiness! Lost to found! Doomed to Blessed!