Developing a Theme

Decorations: The most obvious would be to have household cleaners all around the room plus the tools you use with the cleaners — mops, brooms, rags, scrubbers, rubber gloves, etc.

Ice Breaker: On one 3×5 card write the name of a cleaner and on a separate 3×5 card write the contents of that cleaner. Mix up the cards and pass them out to your ladies. Give the ladies 5 minutes to find their match. Another idea would be to play a “Can you name this cleaner?” matching game with the content labels of cleaners. You will be surprised at how many names you won’t be able to pronounce!

Activity: You can have a decorating contest using medical rubber gloves. Blow them up and have the ladies decorate their own rooster. You could also use these gloves for decorations around the room. Play a quick game of “cleaner replacement.” There are several items we all have at home that work just as well as a $4 bottle of name brand cleaner. Compile a list and see how the ladies do at matching up the items. For example, vinegar cleans off rust and is much cheaper than your rust remover chemicals.

Nametags: Write their name on a rubber glove and pin it on their shirt. Imitate the back label of a cleaner as a template for a nametag. Rags could be ripped up and then use laundry markers for writing their name. Different color rags could divide the group if needed for a game. If you did place settings, you could use pumice stones, write their name on it, and then let them keep the stone!

Game: Rubber glove relay sounds fun. Have the ladies separate into two teams and each player has to put on the rubber gloves and then take them off and hand them to the next lady in line. First team to put the gloves on and off wins! Another relay would be to have a pile of cleaners at the front of the room and each time a lady goes up, she has to put on or pick up another cleaner or item so that by the end of the line, the last lady is carrying 10-20 items in one load. Some items that could be used are an apron, rubber gloves, a breathing mask, different cleaner bottles, a toilet brush, a broom and mop, a dustpan, a mop bucket, trash bags, a squeegee, and a phone since usually mothers get calls in the midst of cleaning. You might even be able to come up with a toilet brush relay!

Devotional: The word clean is found over 100 times in the Bible, and when you study the word clean, you find that it means to be bright; to be pure (physically sound, clear, unadulterated; uncontaminated; morally innocent or holy); to purge, purify. It’s often used in connection with someone or something cleansing or being cleansed. God had definite regulations for the process of cleansing in the Old Testament. It reminds me of the back of our cleaners today. “Harmful if swallowed; keep away from eyes; etc.” We can use cleaners the wrong way, and the results can be dangerous. When the people of Israel didn’t follow God’s prescribed methods of cleansing, the results were harmful. How can we apply that to our lives today? Is God in the business of cleansing? Psalm 119:9-11 speaks of God’s #1 cleaner. And God also talks about where He begins His cleaning — the heart. Some of your ladies may never have given a devotional. Sometimes you just have to give them an idea to get started. How does God create a clean heart within us? See John 15:3. His Word is a cleanser. When we read farther in John 15, we see there are results of His cleansing and the disciples’ abiding in Him. I love the smell of a clean house, and I’m sure God loves the fragrance of a clean heart. When you use an acrostic, a visual or handout helps to highlight the thoughts for the ladies. An idea for an acrostic study of “clean” based on Psalm 51:10 can be found below. Using a blackboard or whiteboard and visualizing the cleansing with pertinent verses of Scripture may help the concept to be remembered.

“In the seventh verse [of Psalm 51] David asked to be clean; now he seeks a heart suitable to that cleanliness; but he does not say, ‘Make my old heart clean’; he is too experienced in the hopelessness of the old nature. He would have the old man buried as a dead thing, and a new creation brought in to fill its place. None but God can create either a new heart or a new earth. Salvation is a marvelous display of supreme power; the work in us as much as that for us is wholly of Omnipotence. The affections must be rectified first, or all our nature will go amiss. The heart is the rudder of the soul, and till the Lord take it in hand we steer in a false and foul way. O Lord, thou who didst once make me, be pleased to new make me, and in my most secret parts renew me” (Charles Spurgeon, Treasury of David).

Clean Acrostic:

Contentment (focus on trust in God)

• I need to believe God has my best interest in mind.

Hebrews 13:5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.

Psalm 84:11 For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.

Love (focus on God and others)

• I need to love as God loves me.

John 13:34-35 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

Encouragement/Edification (focus on others)

• I need to build up others.

Ephesians 4:29 Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.

Edify means to be a “house builder.”

Comfort means to “come near to exhort.”

Attitude of Caring (focus on “I’m thankful for you”)

• I need to come alongside others to help.

2 Corinthians 1:4 Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.

1 Thessalonians 5:9-11 For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do.

Newness of Spirit—and renew a right spirit within me

• God, help me know You are always near me. I need to believe God is near.

Psalm 51:11 Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

Psalm 51:12 Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.

Unclean acrostic:

U—Where is the focus? On U

N—Not God

Covetousness (focus on yourself)

Psalm 119:36 Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not to covetousness.

Luke 12:15 And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.

Lust (focus on yourself)

Psalm 81:12 So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.

Galatians 5:16 This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.

Envy/Evil speaking (focus on yourself)

Proverbs 24:1 Be not thou envious against evil men, neither desire to be with them.

Proverbs 14:30 A sound heart is the life of the flesh: but envy the rottenness of the bones.

Anger (focus on “you owe me”)

Psalm 37:8 Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil.

Proverbs 16:32 He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.

Naughty—good description of our hearts when the focus is on ourselves (extreme filthiness; dirtiness; nastiness)

Proverbs 6:12-14 A naughty person, a wicked man, walketh with a froward mouth. He winketh with his eyes, he speaketh with his feet, he teacheth with his fingers; Frowardness is in his heart, he deviseth mischief continually; he soweth discord.

James 1:21 Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.