The stench of urine

"Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins."
James 4:17

There is a certain potty-trained someone in my house who seems to have forgotten that she does indeed know how to use a toilet. This petite and spunky short person shall remain nameless.


As I am sitting on my deeply hated red couch I smell it. I get a good whiff and am once again angered to my core. It is the smell of pee and it has invaded my living room. I have washed couch covers daily due to the dark beauty of the house who has decided that she is too busy to stop what she is doing/watching/singing to/ignoring to get off her little butt and go to the pot. She has peed on the couch daily, sometimes more than once, and on the carpet as well, for about a week and a half now. See, the problem in my eyes is that she knows how to use the potty. She knows that she needs to get up and actually go to the bathroom where she will push her green and white stool to the potty where she will sit; then she is to wash her hands with soap and water and dry them not on her shirt or on the dirty clothes left behind by the biggest kid in the house, but on a towel.

So why doesn't she do it? Why doesn't she do what she knows she is supposed to do? The answer is short and not so sweet: sin. At her core she is rebellious and enjoys going against everything she knows she is to do. Right now this is true for just about every rule in our house. If she is not supposed to do it, she will; and if she is told to do something, she won't. When it comes to potty training, this little rebel is seriously about to break her mother. I am frustrated, disappointed, and just plain angry. Then to make it all a little bit worse, when I notice her wet behind and ask if she peed in her pants, she proceeds to lie to my face! How dare she! Like I can't see the giant wet spot on the back of her dress.

If I am this frustrated and disappointed, how must God feel when I refuse to do the good I know I am to do? I know spending regular time in the word is good for me, yet it isn't part of my daily routine. I know I need to be in prayer for Scott and for my babies. I know this is for our good but do I do it? Nope. I am no better than Jordan wetting my pants and leaving behind the stench of my sin.