There is something in the pool

It was the first time time that I ever had a first hand experience of this sort at the pool.  I suppose I've always known that it happens, but somehow those potent chlorine fumes numb my mind and make me push the thought away.  The lifeguard's whistle blew and she ordered everyone out of the pool.  All the kids with their questioning faces moped toward the edge, the parents herding their anxious children away.  I overheard one child ask the lifeguard, "What is happening?"  Her answer was rehearsed and adequately vague. 
"Oh, we just need to get 'something' out of the pool."
Enter the lifeguard who had drawn the short straw.  She was armed with an over sized goldfish net and a red bio-hazard bag.  The other lifeguards were searching and pointing as the offending "something" floated down the lazy river.  The bio-hazard lifeguard was wading into the red zone.  I could almost feel her eyes burning as she didn't want to blink, lest something bump into her leg or get under her toes.  She scooped with precision and confidence and nabbed something, slipping it into the red plastic bag.  All eyes were locked onto the activity and I could see kids asking their parents the question that they didn't want to answer.
And then it happened.  I made a phenomenal sociological discovery.  As the lifeguards raised their hand and blew the "all clear" on their plastic whistles I watched as the crowd become segregated.  The children charged back to the water.  Not caring or understanding what they had just witnessed, the children plowed back into the water.  But there was a separate population; the parents.  Even the dad with the Yosemite Sam tattoo on his shoulder didn't charge wild west-style back in.  I could feel the adults weighing the options in their minds.  How long have we been here?  Could we just go home?  How effective is chlorine, anyway? 
I turned my boys toward the locker room.  "Time to go, boys."
The next day I drew a startling parallel.  I was sitting in church and listening to the series leading up to Easter concerning the cross.  The pastor noted that there was no other logical, acceptable, or appropriate sacrifice besides that of Christ to redeem the fallen world.  God's own son, who had no part in the sins of the world condescended to human likeness, lived a perfect life, and took the wrath of a wholly just God on his shoulders.  And he did it so that I could have community with him forever.  My mind flashed back to the pool. 
That poor lifeguard had not chosen to be the one to enter the tainted pool.  She had drawn the short straw.  She hadn't made the mess, someone else had.  She was probably only getting paid a little above minimum wage to hunt down the "something" in the pool.  And immediately after she had paid the price to clean the mess, the kids were ready to wade right back in. 
Christ didn't want to bear the sins of the world on his human shoulders.  But he valued the will of his Father over his own.  Jesus didn't make the mess, he continually pointed us away from it.  And he paid the ultimate price to clean it up. 
How will I respond?  Will I hop right back into the mess and wallow with the youth?  Or will I take my family by the hand, turn away from the filth, and see what He has done for me outside in the fresh air. 
Fresh air never tasted so sweet.

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