What’s Dangling In Your Life?

Coming into our home, Lauren and Chris greeted Keith and me.  After arriving from Frisco and dropping Logan off at the other grandparents, they planned to ride with us to a rehearsal dinner in San Antonio.  “You look great” I told Lauren and Chris, hugging them hello.  With a few minutes to spare before we left the house, Lauren jumped into a topic of necessity:  “Mom, do you have a purse I can borrow that goes with this outfit?”  Only women can understand the importance of her question and of the need to properly accessorize.  “I have just the one!  You’re not going to believe it.  It’s the color of your dress,” I offered.  With her trailing me into my bedroom and closet, I climbed on the step stool and reached for an evening bag I’d purchased years ago.  “Can you believe it?  It’s the exact color of your dress!”  As an aside word of explanation to golfers and hunters, this is comparable to making a birdie or shooting a trophy buck.  With minutes ticking before we left, Lauren opened the purse to transfer her things into it.  “Mom, you’ve never used it,” she noticed, pulling the paper packaging from the inside of it.  “I know.  I bought it thinking it would match something and it didn’t.  You can have it.  It’s perfect with your dress.” All women will know how hard it is to let go of a beautiful purse. I told her if you want to keep your purse looking amazing then you must learn to clean it properly. That was the T&C’s of her becoming the purses permanent owner.

Hours later we arrived home from the dinner and fell into bed.  The next morning, I walked into the breakfast room and spotted the purse on the breakfast table.  Picking it up, I reflected on how nice it was that it was such a perfect purse for Lauren to carry the previous night.  Then, I noticed a little string hanging from the strap.  Looking closer, I realized it was the price tag.  At first, I sighed, thinking “Oh, no.  Lauren walked around at the rehearsal dinner all night with the price tag hanging out of her purse.”  The visual wasn’t a pretty one.  Then, as I often do these days, I decided to see the humor in the situation. My thoughts immediately turned to Minnie Pearl, who was on the television show, Hee-Haw, eons ago.  For younger readers, she characteristically wore a hat with the price tag dangling from it.  Yes, Lauren must have looked like that, I chuckled, envisioning my beautiful daughter with the rhinestone studded bag, price tag dangling.

Then, my thoughts turned toward God and a more serious consideration.  Looking at the price tag hanging from the purse, I wondered how I must often look like that purse to God.  I style my hair, put on makeup, dress, and earrings in an attempt to look presentable.  Yet often there is something in my life not in keeping with God’s desire for me.  Rather, I have some sin dangling as the price tag did on the purse.  Although God has already paid for me, as 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 explains, and the dangling sin cost Christ His life, I don’t cut off the offensive sin.  

The story continues.  Later, I asked Lauren, “Honey, didn’t you see the price tag?”  Her reply? “Oh, mom, I carried it as a clutch.  The strap was on the inside of the purse so nobody saw the price tag.”  Relieved that she hadn’t walked around all night with the price tag dangling, I couldn’t help but once more think about God and my sin.  “Sure enough.  That’s what I sometimes do.  I stuff my sin inside where people can’t see it.”  “However,” God convicted me, “it’s still there. I see it.” 

I immediately started to remove the little white tag from the purse, but instead, brought it into my office and placed it on my desk, where I am now writing this article.  I’ll soon remove the tag and put the purse away or see if Lauren wants it.  However, I think I’ll do more than just remove the tag from the purse.  I think I’ll also kneel before the Lord and address the sin that is dangling in my life.  I think I’ll do that so God can carry me where He wants, unashamedly. 

What about you?  Is there any sin dangling in your life?  If so, I hope you’ll join me in removing, rather than keeping it.  

“For you have been bought with a price.  Therefore glorify God in your body.”  1 Corinthians 6:20. 

“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,” Hebrews 12:1.