God the Shoe Shiner

You know those shoes that just go with everything? They're new, they're cool, and most importantly, they're neat, they're clean; they're perfect. 

I came to church with perfect shoes, ‘cause perfect was exactly what I was reaching for. I had heard of God’s love ever since I was a kid and it made TOTAL sense. I understood what it meant to love and be loved unconditionally, and this was easily applicable to my relationship with God. He loved us unconditionally, yes, of course! Some people around me struggled with their relationship with God because they felt inadequate or undeserving of this love, and I truly wondered how this could be when it was clearly all so very easy. To be fair, I hadn’t walked their paths. It was clear their shoes were dirtier than mine. “Come as you are” they sang in church. I gladly did, showing my purest of hearts and cleanest of shoes to God like a kid shows their perfect grade to a parent.

When I was 16 I made a mistake. Unlike other mistakes I had made before, this mistake stung and gnawed and seeped from the cracks. I had fallen. I had gone too far. It was worse knowing it wasn’t an accident, rather it had been very intentional despite knowing I was in the wrong. I had stepped onto ice and gotten my shoes slop-soaked despite the blaring sign that the ice was too thin. I finally understood why people would shy away from God. Why wouldn't they when they had done such horrible things? As I stuffed my shoes into the back of my closet to avoid their smell, I persisted in digging myself deeper and deeper into the fact that I was now not good enough anymore. I had made a decision while standing on the wrong ground, and now I would have to stand by it. I was not deserving. If God still loved me it would only be a reflection of pity. I fell into thought. I thought about my shoes.

God seemed to me like a shoe shiner. No matter how many times you mess up your shoes, he’s right back at cleaning them, if you come to him and let him. Coming clean felt like putting a muddy boot on God’s shiner box; mud dripping, shoelaces untied and shabby, gunk flying as I put down the weight of my sinful shoe. And yet there he was with open arms and a shiner brush. Why was this hard to understand? Maybe I had looked at myself as being above these things, that I was so great I would never make any mistakes in life. Maybe I hadn’t realized how human I was until I was confronted with it dead center. Why would God be a shoe shiner if not for our dirty shoes.

The next time I came to church I noticed a girl wearing the same boots as me, though I now wore mine knowing they were just as good as any other shoes. She dared show me how the mud had stained her soles. This time round, I knew exactly which shiner box to point her to.

CCHIO