Proverbs 24:3-4 

 Through wisdom is an house builded; and by understanding it is established:

 And by knowledge shall the chambers be filled with all precious and pleasant riches.

I remember when our neighbors in Louisiana moved into their new house. In fact, I remember it so vividly because construction had finished two months prior and they hadn’t yet moved.

“Why haven’t y’all moved in yet?” I asked. If I’d just built my dream home, I’d have moved in while the crew was packing, I thought to myself.

“Because we are filling it with all new stuff. I’m not even bringing a single dish to the new house and I’m not moving in until I’ve replaced every last thing.”

Well, it made sense. Sort of. I mean, her rejects still looked like a page out of Better Homes and Gardens and my furnishings screamed Goodwill-meets-Dumpster Salvage. So I didn’t completely understand.

Until today.

Twenty-two years later as I’m studying Proverbs, I came across the verse above.

The bottom line was, she didn’t want to put her old junk in her new house.

And yet, as Christians, we do it all the time.

We have this new vessel, sanctified and set apart unto Christ. And it starts clean and pure.

But slowly we start bringing the junk from our old house over. We stick it in a closet because we don’t want to get rid of it, just in case we need it. We decide we can’t live without some of that old stuff and put it right there in the foyer.

My friend Susan is about to move into a new house. She and her family are super excited, as evidenced by the fact that her teenage boys began packing on their own. If you’ve ever had teenage boys you understand how huge that is.

But before they move, Susan wants to be sure to gather all the garbage from her trash cans so she can move them into her new house. Leftover food, paper scraps, discarded shoes…it’s important that she get it all before they settle in.

Of course, that part isn’t true. The last thing she wants in her new house is old trash. It sounded absurd to even think about doing that.

And yet, we do it all the time….

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