Behold the Wisdom of the Cheese Grater

All right, peeps. Here comes another "Behold the Wisdom" post. I hope you're ready for it ;)

First things first, I want to make sure that you all know that I'm speaking from experience here. I'm not perched high atop my pedestal of sinless perfection, looking down at the rest of the world in disgust. I'm not squirting out theoretical hand sanitizer after contact with 'those other, normal people'.

Nope. I'm human just like everyone else.

. . . .

Have you ever washed a cheese grater by hand? Have you ever washed one that has cheese dried all over it?

{source}

Yeah. If you just let out a grunt of pity, you know what I'm talking about. If cheese isn't almost immediately rinsed off, it sticks to the metal like it was born to it. It takes much elbow grease and not a few puffs of exasperation to get that stuff off. And even after you manage to get all of the chunks and remaining shreds washed down the drain, you still have to argue with the film-stuff that seems to never come off.

Grrr. . .

Can you tell what I did tonight? :)

So, as I was busy scrubbing the daylights out of my cheese grater and repeating in my head "I love my husband! I love my husband!" {I don't blame him for forgetting to rinse it off and leaving it for his wife to wash, I swear. I really DO love my husband! hahaha!}, a weird epiphany occurred to me.

I compared the crusty cheese to our bad habits and sins, and the grater representing ourselves, or our lives in general.

See where I'm going with this?

If we don't take steps to eliminate any bad habits from our lives shortly after realizing we have them, they become insanely difficult to rectify. Trust me. I may have mentioned this earlier, but I've started taking private violin lessons from the very talented and knowledgeable concert master in the symphony I perform with {which you can read more about HERE if you're insanely bored or stalking me}. To make a long story short, I've developed bad habits over the 14 years I've been playing. And now I have to fix them.

And it's like pulling my own teeth with needle nose pliers. Blindfolded. In a snow storm. Upside down.

It's hard.

I've wanted to give up multiple times, but I feel like I'm finally beginning to make some progress. It's rewarding to finally see those "cheese crunchies wash off my grater". I love feeling like those bad habits are no longer controlling how I play the violin. The opportunity to be an exponentially greater violinist is now within my reach. But before I was able to hope for that, I had to work to scrub my talent clean.

. . . .

Now, I'm not referring to strictly physical bad habits with this analogy. Hardly. I just used that example because it's the freshest in my mind. Physical bad habits are a pain in the bum sometimes, but it's the bad habits crippling our morality that are the things we really have to look out for. Those are the things that distance us from the guidance and protection of the Holy Spirit, and eventually run the risk of keeping us from returning to live with our Father in Heaven.

Bad news.

I dare you to say that out loud and not laugh. :)

No, but seriously. No one is perfect, and no one is expected to become so in this lifetime. But what we ARE expected to do is arrive spotless at the judgment bar through the Atonement of our beloved Savior, Jesus Christ. Our cheese graters can be spotless because of Him, not because of our own scrubbing.

Scrub, scrub, scrub, my friends! Apply the Atonement in your life and wash away your sins and weaknesses. It'll be one of the hardest {if not the hardest} thing you will ever do. You'll be oh-so-tempted to give up, but keep working at it. It will be worth it when you're clean again. I pinky swear!

One thing I want you to remember from this spout is that I'm not saying that you can/will never grate any cheese {or in other words: you will never make any mistakes or develop bad habits. Those things happen naturally as a result of the passage of time and our fallen state}. What I'm trying to point out is that you need to rinse off your grater immediately. Keep it as clean as possible, and the scrubbing will be minimal.

Now go show those cheese crusties who's boss. . . :)

. . . .

{To read more "Behold the Wisdom" posts, click HERE and HERE}