Out with the Ick, In with the Peace

As a writer, I’ve often wished I could exchange brains with witty, truth-gritty Rhonda Rhea. She says more with 15 minutes of humor than most people spout in an hour. In this Spiritual Life UPGRADE, Rhonda explains how a decluttered mind can help us grow in peace.

“O, they tell me of an unclouded brain!” Rhonda says. “How can I exchange brain clutter for peace?”

An unclouded brain. An uncluttered brain. I (Dawn) would like either one! Too much brain fog lately! Help me, Rhonda!

Rhonda continues…

I had a wrestling match with my vacuum recently. It was doing that wimpy-clean thing—you know, where you have to get down on your hands and knees and hand-feed it every little fuzz ball?

If I’m going to do that, I might as well not have a vacuum cleaner. I could just pick up the fuzz and throw it in the trash myself, right?

A vacuum that’s lost all its “suck-ocity” is not worth much. So I got the thing in a headlock to find the problem.

Hey, why are the contents of a vacuum cleaner always gray? It doesn’t matter what color your carpet is. Doesn’t matter what color dirt you’ve tracked in. The vacuum dirt is always gray. What is that?

Every once in a while I kind of wonder if I lost my mind, then vacuumed it up.

Amongst the disgusting gray matter, I found a problematic little lump of sock. Then there was that piece of string. While I call it a string, it was more like a length of yarn that could’ve been an entire sweater in another life.

I was also surprised to find what I thought was a loofa. But then I realized it was just a bunch of those little plastic fishing-line-like connectors that attach price tags to things. Who knew they could find each other inside the dark recesses of the vacuum and form their own little solar system? Weird.

At least it gave me a little reminder. When we let our minds suck up the wrong things, we can’t expect them to work the way they’re supposed to either.

We need to stay alert to emptying out the dirt clods and to filling our minds with thoughts that feed our spirits and grow our faith.

Negative, evil thoughts will find each other in the dark recesses of our minds.

And they multiply.

The next thing you know, you find yourself with a solar-system-sized problem in your thought life.

There’s so much garbage available to us. On the Internet, TV, movies, magazines—it’s accessible at every turn of the head. If we let our minds continually suck up trashy junk, we shouldn’t be surprised when we have difficulty walking out our faith-life well.

It’s not just a matter of emptying our minds. No one wants to stay empty-headed.

We don’t want our minds filled with mere fluff either.

It’s about filling our minds well. Paul tells us in Philippians 4:8-9 what we’re to feed on: 

 “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.”

There’s a lot less wrestling with our minds when we fill them with the right things.

Less wrestling, more peace. As a matter of fact, that passage doesn’t simply say we’ll experience great peace, it tells us that the God of peace Himself will be “with” us. Remembering His presence makes all the difference.

And as far as the vacuum is concerned, I think it’ll make a difference there if I clean the thing out a little more often. Pretty sure I found a gerbil. Even though we’ve never had one.

Ready to de-clog, getting rid of anything cluttering up your mind and stealing away your peace?

Rhonda Rhea is a humor columnist and the author of 10 nonfiction books, including Espresso Your Faith and Join the Insanity—Crazy-Fun Life in the Pastors’ Wives Club. She also coauthors fiction with her daughter, Kaley Faith Rhea. Their first novel, Turtles in the Road, releases this fall with two more completed and coming soon. Rhonda speaks at conferences and events all over the country and she and her daughters host the TV show, That’s My Mom, for Christian Television Network’s KNLJ airing in mid-Missouri.

Article adapted from Espresso Your Faith: 30 Shots of God’s Word to Keep You Focused on Christ.