Dirty Laundry

My black lab, Jasmine, is absolutely enthralled when I separate the laundry. On Saturday mornings, she sits and watches eagerly as I pull each item of clothing from the basket and separate it into the appropriate pile. Nose gently reaching out, she thoroughly sniffs the clothes, taking entirely too much delight in breathing in the smells of yesterday’s journey.

There are people that are equally enthralled with other people’s dirty laundry. They gleefully investigate each morsel of someone’s journey of yesterday and memorize it so they can vomit it back out again to listening ears. There’s just one problem with vomit. It stinks.

I can hear Don Henley singing …
Dirty little secrets, dirty little lies
We got our dirty little fingers in everybody's pie
Love to cut you down to size, we love dirty laundry
Kick 'em when they're up, kick 'em when they're down
Kick 'em when they're up, kick 'em all around

The tabloids make me nauseous. Go to any news website or TV channel and – in order to actually get any news - you will have to work your way around the celebrity “news.” Who cares how many babies Angelie wants to adopt. Or how many pills Lindsey has popped. Or that Brittney’s back in rehab again. Or how many women Tiger slept with. Wasn’t one more than his wife more than enough?

Oh my soul! Don’t we have more important things to ponder?

Why are we as a people obsessed with others’ undoing?

The Pharisees were obsessed with dirty laundry. They had tattle-tales scattered all over the countryside to dig up and bring back tasty bits of gossip – all so they could call out the offender in public … which made them feel pious and righteous.

Hey, wait a minute! Isn’t that why we do it?

To feel superior? To fend off our own feelings of inferiority and filth?

When the Pharisees brought the adulterous woman before Christ, they quoted the law of Moses and then dared Jesus to refute the law. After writing interesting tidbits in the dust for a while, Jesus agreed – on one condition: “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!”

I'm thinkin' it got pretty quiet.

And I wonder what He was writing in the dust?

Perhaps He was listing the hidden sins of the Pharisees. Maybe that’s why they skulked away without a word.

I have a past that has been forgiven by the Creator of the Universe. What right do I – of all people – have to point a finger at someone else? Indeed ... do any of us have that right?

As my husband always says, “when I point a finger at you, there are four more pointing back at me.” (That kinda sounds Forrest Gump-ish, doesn’t it?)

Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged. And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, “Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,” when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye. Don’t waste what is holy on people who are unholy. Don’t throw your pearls to pigs! They will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you.” Matthew 7:1-6 (NLT)

Hmmmm…. Was Jesus calling the Pharisees “pigs”?