Clean Up the Inside

 At a quick glance, your room may appear to be neat and clean. However, upon closer inspection, you may see something different. You may be thinking, "Why would that be?" Well, in our rooms (whether it's the bedroom or the classroom), there are cabinets and closets. Within these cabinets and closets are a lot of stuff! As a matter of fact, we often have stuff in them that we didn't know about or forgot we put in there. Can anybody relate?! I know I can. I have found some of my most best and treasured items buried in the back of my closet or cabinet 😊. On the other hand, I have also found things I didn't need to keep buried in the back of my closet or cabinet. It's important to know what to keep and get rid of (see Ecclesiastes 3:6). You see, this was very important for me to keep in mind last Wednesday afternoon as I decided to clean out the cabinet in my classroom. The school year ended on last Friday (cue praise break music 👏👏!!). I made it! Overall, I am grateful to God for all the lessons and blessings in the 2023-2024 school year 🙏💝!! To prepare to end the school year, there were some things I had to do in my classroom to make sure I was ready. One of those things was cleaning. Now, this is not just something that I started last week as I clean and get rid of things as the year goes on. But, on this particular week, I tackled cleaning to a whole new level and that included my classroom cabinet. This cabinet had been stuffed with items from myself and previous teachers that had been in the classroom. Some of these items had already been moved out, but some hadn't. There were also items all mixed up and it lacked organization.  For anyone who knows me well, I love to be organized 💗! So, that Wednesday afternoon I mentioned earlier, I decided to purge and organize the cabinet. Since I had already cleaned it some, it wasn't as bad as it could be, but there was still a lot of stuff to sort through. I remember pulling out items and inspecting things shelf by shelf in my cabinet. I put stuff on the floor and in my comfy chairs. Stuff was everywhere! To a person walking by, it looked like chaos. I admit that I got tired at some points and took breaks, but I pressed through. I knew going through the process was necessary to get the results I wanted. I threw some of the items away from the cabinet. Some of the items, I donated to a designated area where teachers and staff could get free items. Other items, I kept. After all the purging and organizing, I opened the cabinet and it looked much better! I felt better and was excited about the result 😊. There were even old flash drives from previous students (students who graduated high school at least 4 or more years ago). They had been sitting in my cabinet for a while, but I didn't ask about them and had let them sit there. In the cleaning, I decided to ask questions about them. It turns out those flash drives can be useful to the technology department. I wouldn't have known unless I chose to purge and ask questions. When I was younger, I didn't like asking questions. Now that I'm older, I've learned there's nothing wrong with asking questions and ask all the questions I can 😊. Just like I chose to clean out my cabinet that Wednesday afternoon, we too have to choose to clean out our heart. You see, we have stuff in our hearts that we don't realize or that we want to forget about. The wrong stuff can stunt our growth. The wrong stuff can hide the good stuff. Behind those flash drives I talked about were games that the students could have played, but they got pushed back and I didn't notice until Wednesday. That's okay as there's always next school year. I pulled them to front, along with a few free board games I picked up at the room where free items were 😊. Every day, we should do a heart check 🙏. What's in our hearts will eventually come out in our actions, attitudes, and words. Cleaning out my cabinet reminded me to keep checking the inside of my heart and get to the root of a thing. Things can look good on the outside, but the inside can be a mess. There can be layers of hurt and pain in our heart, just like we can have layers of stuff in our closets and cabinets. The more we toss, the more piles we have. Let's be careful what we let pile in our hearts. Matthew 12:35 says, "For the mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart." Jesus further addressed the inside of the heart in Matthew 23:25-26. So, my encouragement to you today: Check your heart daily. Look at every crack and crevice. Address big and small things. See if any situation or issue has been pushed back that you have forgotten about. Ask questions. Talk to God always. Talk to others as needed. Sort through things physically and spiritually. Peel back layers and look for anything that's been buried. Today, let's uncover anything that's stunting our growth. Keep only what you need and that will value you. Let's pray Psalms 51:10 daily. Let's continue to clean up the inside because what's in us will come out. It will be worth it! I don't know about you, but I only want joy, peace, love, forgiveness, gratefulness, and beautiful things overflowing out of my heart and life💝!!! May God bless you!!