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PROGRAM D-8293
Do you believe that cleanliness is next to godliness? You’ve heard that many times, haven’t you? It sounds like it’s straight out of the Bible, but it’s not! I’m pointing out five things the Bible does not say, and let me assure you that the Bible does not say “Cleanliness is next to godliness.”
Now of course it’s good to be clean and to keep your environment clean. God doesn’t approve of sloppiness or unsterile places or people. But to suggest that you must be clean to be godly is certainly not true. Furthermore, to say that because you are dirty, you can’t be close to God or know God is never right.
Don’t you think that sometimes we isolate ourselves from people we might consider “unclean,” whose standards of dress or way of life is below what we might call acceptable? Jesus never did that, you know. He associated with lowly people—poor and needy people.
Many times in my visits to Africa, I visited homes that were very basic—mud huts, small shacks in the slums of Nairobi, simple dwellings with very few comforts. I found some of the most godly people I’ve met in those places. The widows I visited in the slums of Nairobi told me how thankful they were for their home and how blessed they were to have a safe place for their children. Not one of them complained about their tin roofs or mud floors.
I have a friend in Kenya whose home is very simple with few furnishings. Her kitchen is a cooking pit with large pans for washing. She grows her own vegetables and milks her own cows. She is one of the hardest working women I know, and she loves Jesus. Her influence in that part of Kenya is amazing. Most of us would not call her home sufficiently clean or sterile, but her godly life is a testimony and encouragement to all who know her.
You know, God doesn’t care about your outer cleanliness nearly as much as your inner cleanliness. Remember what he said to the very clean religious Pharisees: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. . .on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness” (Matthew 23:25,28).
So, cleanliness is not next to godliness—loving Jesus and living for him is what makes us godly.