The mundane, monotonous work of continuous diaper changes is no small task. Thousands of diapers from each child one may have.
I find that I don’t mind diaper changing until my children get older and begin to thrash around and then it becomes like alligator wrestling.
“I don’t want you to get a rash, it’ll just hurt worse!”
“Stop fighting me, it will be over soon!”
“This is for your good!”
“Don’t you want to be clean?”
Many children don’t mind sitting in their filth, and they don’t understand how gross it is! All their parents want to do is just clean them. What picture of the Gospel! Like the scenario above, we as sinners just sit in our filth, not realizing how truly gross and harmful it is until God our Father reveals Himself to us and cleanses us from our sins through salvation.
When we become followers of Christ, we then really discover that we actually are filthy and that we need our Savior. Just like how an infant cannot clean and change themselves, apart from Christ we too cannot cleanse ourselves from our sin.
“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
-Ephesians 2:8-9 (English Standard Version)
By grace, not us. Not our own doing, but God’s. Not our works, thankfully so, but God Who justifies.
Our sinfulness, our filth, does not deter God. Rather, He welcomes us with open arms and loves to forgive and cleanse us from our sins.
Do you love your child any less because of one, disgusting, explosive diaper? Or even many that somehow seem to repeat itself after feeding your child blueberries? Of course not! What a silly thing to consider, their physical filth doesn’t change your love for your children.
“The testimony of the entire Bible, culminating in Matthew 11:29, is that God defies what we instinctively feel by embracing his people in their mess.”
-Dane Ortlund (Deeper: Real Change for Real Sinners)
When we follow God, we will have setbacks. Sometimes we take one step forward and three backwards. Lamentations 3:23 tells of how God’s mercies are new every morning. His mercies are not old, they are not last week’s mercies He’s shown you, they are not the same mercies as yesterday, but they are mercies that are new every morning.
I will end by leaving y’all with a liturgy for changing diapers from the book Every Moment Holy.
“Ah Lord, what a mess we sometimes make of our lives! What a tragic comedy is even our most sincere attempt to merit righteousness on our own.
We are no more able to render ourselves holy than is this infant to keep itself unsoiled.
I am as dependent upon your grace and your own righteousness, O Christ, to justify and make me clean, as this little one is dependent upon me to wash the residue of filth from its skin, wrapping it again in soft and freshly-laundered garments.
Let me not be frustrated by the constant repetition of this necessary act on behalf of a child.
Rather, let the daily doing of this be a reminder to me, of the constant cleansing and covering of my own sin, that I-helpless as this babe and more often in need-enjoy in the active mercies of Christ.
Amen.”