Lessons From a Car Wash

Occasionally a personal experience may have an extensive lesson, and this is one of those times.

On a recent drive to Nashville, Tennessee for the annual National Religious Broadcasters convention, our road salt-covered car needed a good bath. While pumping gas, I noticed that the station had a car wash attached to the food mart. I punched in the request, and my receipt printed at the pump and gave me an authorization number.

I drove around the building to the pay console and entry into the automatic wash tunnel, which was dead ahead. A pickup truck was parked motionless on the carwash track with an irritated driver getting in and out of the cab. Eventually he came back to the pay console, which was just outside my window. He told me that the car wash wasn’t working even though he’d put his $5.00 in. Nothing was happening, and he’d been back and forth pushing every refund button possible. The people inside the food mart were unable to help since they had nothing to do with the car wash.

He stooped down to peer into the scratched and sun faded pay console, which indicated he should put in two more dollars. He said he wouldn’t do that since he’d already put in a five dollar bill. Frustrated, he slowly drove off through the waterless wash tunnel and out of sight around the building.

We thought that we, too, might have the problem, but we thought we’d give it a try. Since we had paid for the car wash at the pump, I had to enter an authorization number on a key pad like the old telephone booth equipment that almost no one uses anymore. I slowly punched in my authorization number. Expecting the worst, I was shocked to hear a whirring like a dead piece of equipment suddenly resurrecting itself. And then kachink … kachink … kachink … kachink 20 times. The machine spat out twenty quarters into a tray—two whole handfuls!

Apparently, the truck driver’s five dollars was being refunded but was transformed from a wrinkled bill into a flood of hard cash. I felt perhaps I’d been transported to Atlantic City or Las Vegas where slot machines seldom turn routine losses into payoffs, though I’ll never know exactly how that works in any actual gambling place.

We tried to find the pickup owner, but he was long gone. I climbed into my car and proceeded through the soak, soap and rinse cycles with his $5.00 refund covering most of the cost of my $7.00 wash.

A total stranger had just inadvertently financed our car wash. Instead of a salt-encrusted, unappealing vehicle, we drove off in a sparkling mini-van fit for the upscale parking lot at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel. We hoped that perhaps we’d find our benefactor at a rest stop, but we never did.

It gave us a lesson of Jesus’ love. Our nameless friend provided us with a car wash, but our Savior gave us a soul wash through His precious blood.

We can musically ask the old hymn question, "Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?" That’s a reaffirmation of Revelation 1:5b & 6: "…To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen."

Christ’s suffering was not accidental but carefully planned from eternity past and named in "the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world" (Rev. 13:8). His payment was supremely costly in cleansing our sins as 1 Peter 1:18-21 puts it. "…knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you."

We regretted we couldn’t find our car wash benefactor, but much worse is failed gratitude to the personal Source of our greatest gift. When Jesus healed ten lepers, only one returned to thank Him. The Lord sadly asked, "But where are the nine?" (Luke 17:17).

Seldom do I find a spiritual lesson in a car wash, but this one will linger a long time. Jesus’ generous self-sacrifice will linger forever. Elisha A. Hoffman set the theme to poetry:

Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing power?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Are you walking daily by the Savior’s side?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Do you rest each moment in the Crucified?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

When the Bridegroom cometh will your robes be white?
Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?
Will your soul be ready for the mansions bright,
And be washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Lay aside the garments that are stained with sin,
And be washed in the blood of the Lamb;
There’s a fountain flowing for the soul unclean,
O be washed in the blood of the Lamb!

Refrain:
Are you washed in the blood,In the soul cleansing blood of the Lamb?Are your garments spotless? Are they white as snow?Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Dave Virkler