Problem Waste

Today was the "Chemical CleanOut" day for our local council, and people are invited to go to the Sydney Motorsport Park to drop off what is considered "problem" waste.  There are many locations where used motor oil can be dropped off to be recycled for free, but I had some petrol contaminated oil that could not be recycled.  After church I went out of my way to swing by the motorsport park in the last hour to drop off the oil and a few old tins of paint that were left in our garage by the previous owners.

As I drove away from the motorsport park--free of all chemical waste that had been sitting in my garage for years--I considered times previous I acquired items or waste products that were illegal to throw away and difficult to offload.  When I worked previously at a church, our storage area had become the dumping grounds for an incredible volume of paint that became my problem.  I remember when it became illegal in California to throw fluorescent tubes into dumpsters because they obtained small amount of mercury.  At one time at my job we had hundreds of the tubes taped together in piles, and because we were a business it was difficult to dispose of them.  What a relief it was when we were able to use a energy saving scheme to go from T12 to T8 tubes--and all those spent tubes were hauled away at no additional cost!

When you have "problem" waste, it is a problem because it is a health risk and potential liability:  it is worth less than nothing because no one wants it, and it will likely cost money to legally be rid of it.  As difficult, dangerous, expensive and inconvenient it may be to dispose of problem waste, it is nothing compared to the deadly scourge of sin that always brings death.  Sin is worse than having tonnes of toxic waste in your home or seeping into the soil; it is far worse than incurable cancer that ravages the body.  It brings a curse upon us we cannot be rid of regardless of what we do.  There is no price we can pay to free ourselves from the burden of sin we add to daily by our pride, selfishness and folly.  Sin will not only result in the death of our bodies but our souls in hell forever.  Sin tortures us by weighing down our conscience and drags us to hell as it suffocates us with hopelessness.

Praise God Jesus has come to seek and save lost sinners and provides cleansing for sin.  For all those repent and trust in Him, Jesus will gladly pardon us--having provided atonement by His shed blood.  Hebrews 10:15-17 says of God's new covenant in Christ's blood:  "But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us; for after He had said before, ¹⁶ "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds I will write them," ¹⁷ then He adds, "Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more."  After "problem waste" is removed from the boot of a vehicle a chemical smell can linger, but God does not remember any of our lawless deeds.  No longer is sin a blight upon our souls, and we are free of guilt having received a full pardon.  How blessed is the Christian who avails himself of God's promise in 1 John 1:9:  "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."