It was time. They had sat around long enough and now it was time to clear out and move on. Two laptops of mine.
One was over six years old and had served me wonderfully during my final years of working at a Church Conference office—taking it with me to camp meetings, women’s retreats, and more.
But now I had a 3ABN work laptop, plus a newer personal laptop at home, and most recently, a laptop for church treasury work.
I understood why I felt the need to purge the older laptops that sat idle day after day and year after year in a closet. One of them was from the 2007 era—almost 20 years old! At one time it was a wonderful blessing, but as it aged, it lost its capacity to stay current.
A factory reset was needed for my two older laptops before I passed them along. That reset would wipe away all my files, folders, photos, and videos—along with whatever I had stored and added as apps for my personal use. Gone!
In a short period of time. They were like brand-new computers, except for their age. They were now a clean slate, so to speak, ready to be a blessing if chosen by someone.
My life, your life—do they need a “factory reset,” too? A start over, fresh and ready for a new day? Do we come to Jesus every morning and throughout the day, asking for that factory reset and requesting to start over?
There are times when things go south in my relationship with my husband. A quick response of words without thinking and without measuring them carefully necessitates my request, “May I have a do-over?” And Daniel is always willing to allow me to begin again.
Some folks think that their life model is too bad—too many mess-ups and so much sin clutter that nothing can be done to salvage it. But the Holy Spirit is right there, prompting them to ask for a do-over, a factory reset in their life, and the Lord Jesus Christ is always receptive and willing to clean the slate. The Bible clearly promises, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26). And Jesus tells us in John 15:3, “Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.”
It doesn’t cost us anything to receive a factory reset—unless we count “dead to self” and “not my will, but Thine be done” as a price. But it certainly did cost our Savior when He left Heaven and the continuous adoration of the heavenly host to come to a world that hated Him. But this He willingly accepted, and now He offers us a factory reset today—a chance to start over again, even amid the messiness and chaos that may be the reminders of our sins.
But, “Oh, the joy that floods my soul. Something happened, and now I know. He touched me and made me whole.”*
Praise God!
*The Gaither Vocal Band, He Touched Me.
