Cleaning the Pipes

April 18, 2006

I got a phone call from Melinda a few minutes ago. She wanted to know if we had water. Immediately I understood why she was asking, and no, we don’t have any water today.

Once a year, in the spring (and I think it’s usually on the 18th or on either side of that date) the city disinfects the water system. I’m sorry, but I find this extremely funny. It’s a pain to live with – no water for 24 hours or maybe a little bit longer, and when the water does come back on you can’t drink it for several hours. It is full of chlorine, I think. Tastes and smells like bleach anyway. It’s funny because everyone is so pleased that now the pipes are clean again, the water system is clean, the water coming out of the pipes is clean. My question is – ok, it will be clean tomorrow when it comes back on – but was it clean and drinkable YESTERDAY, and the day before, and the day before that. Has it ever been clean since the day after they cleaned the system last year? One day a year, or maybe two or three while all of the chemicals finally disappear, the water system is clean. The water is “safe to drink” again.

Now I am not a fan of the taste of chlorine in my water in the States, but when I drink it and taste that ‘wonderful’ bleachy taste, I know that everything that we know to do has been done to keep our water supply safe and drinkable. I’m not naïve enough to think the water is 100% pure – I’ve read too much, to think that way. Books like, The Coming Plague, which came out over 10 years ago (can’t remember the author, but while in the States last year, I did see it is still available, scaring people at the larger bookstores). And that process happens all the time, day after day, hour after hour people are making sure that the water is cleaned, purified, tested and then sent down the pipes for American consumption.

Here, they clean the pipes once a year. This is why we use a water filter for everything we drink, or buy bottled water, which we dream is pure.

On Sunday night I was talking to my son-in-law via Instant Messaging, and he used a phrase that reminds me of our water situation. He said something about the C&E crowd at church this past Sunday. Christmas and Easter. We always knew that the crowds in church would be large on Christmas and Easter. People coming in for their once, or maybe twice yearly “cleaning of the pipes, purifying of their water systems.” Although I find the idea of cleaning the pipes here once a year very funny, I find it equally as tragic when it comes to spiritual things. Once a year Joe and Mary, or maybe it’s Jessica and Josh now, (Sergei and Natasha here) decide to head to church. They want to get in their yearly church attendance so that when they die and get to heaven they can say to Peter, at the Pearly Gates of course, “Hey! Let me in! I went to church at least once a year, and several years I even went twice! Look at how pure and clean I am because of that action!”

At least the water pipes will be clean here for a few hours, but attending church once or twice a years does absolutely nothing to clean the human soul and purify it, make it ready to enter heaven. Only the blood of Jesus Christ can wash away our sin, purify us and open those Pearly Gates.

(I’ve always thought Peter has better things to do with his time up there anyway, than to stand around at the Pearly Gates all day.)