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How many of you remember bluing solution? Way back in the early to mid ‘60’s, Mom and Grandma would never finish a load of wash (laundry, if you prefer!) without adding some bluing when they did the whites. Now, I never understood why they did this but one of the two explained it kind of like this: “Honey, the bluing makes the whites look whiter.”

Sure enough, when I would add chlorine bleach it did add a yellowish tinge to my T-shirts—among other things—but the bluing, even though it’s literally a deep blue color, made the whites look whiter.

For many years, I never used bluing, nor did I think about it very much. Besides, in some of the places where I lived, it didn’t seem to be available. Okay, I didn’t look all that hard for it but it would have been nice to have!

But would you believe, just this year, a few months earlier in 2019 as I write this, I found a bottle of bluing! It was a small bottle, but it has enough liquid to last me a long, long time. You see, the maker recommended only a drop or two of bluing to a half-gallon or so of water. I put a couple of drops in the wash water—we don’t have too many white clothes—and, they’re looking better!

The trouble is, that bottle may last me for years to come. I mean, suppose it was an 8-ounce bottle, and I only use a couple of drops a week. That bottle of bluing may still be good forever!

There is a Scriptural parallel for this. David prayed for forgiveness in Psalm 51:7, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” Isaiah once observed that “all our righteousnesses are as filty rags (Isa. 64:6),” but he also quoted God as saying “Come now and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool (Isa. 1:18)”. Years later, the Apostle John would write, “. . . the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin (1 John 1:7).” It’s true, so true, we can be forgiven, and it’s all because of Jesus and the blood He shed for us. Even better, He makes us clean!

And not a single drop of bluing was required.

Hey, does anybody need some bluing?

Scripture quotations taken from the King James Version of the Bible (KJV)

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