The Sacred Dump

(I found this little devotional I wrote after a missions trip to Mexico)

Unwrapping the pieces of sliced cheese, I looked for a place to throw away the plastic wrappers.

“Throw ‘em on the ground,” Dave said.

Dave was the local Vineyard worker who had taken our mission team to the Mazatlan Dump. We were making cheeseburgers for scavenger workers at the dump. Dozens of men and women every day sort through the dump for trash to sell; cardboard and plastic.

Dave told us when they first began to preparing hot lunches for the workers, they used to be mobbed. They were afraid that the food would run out. But now the people waited patiently until the food was ready because they had learned there would always be plenty for everyone.

Anyway, back to the unwrapping the cheese thing; it was shocking to realize that we could just drop the plastic wrappers on the ground. Because we were…you know… at the dump. And it’s OK to litter at the dump, because it’s not littering, because the dump is the place litter is ultimately supposed to go.

For me, that makes the dump a sacred place -- or at least an image of a sacred place. That sacred place is the cross where we can drop our garbage, our sin. Colossians 2:13b & 2:14b explains, “God made you alive in Christ, He forgave us all our sins…nailing it to the cross.”

We don’t need to hold on to our sins, we can dump them at the cross of Christ.