Self-Cleaning Ovens

I was working at church today,  having been given the task of cleaning two ovens. One was a standard, get up to your elbows in grease type oven, and the other was self-cleaning. I set the self-cleaning timer, the oven door locked, and I went to work scrubbing the other one. To accomplish this task, I used two types of cleanser and scrubby pads, and even with all that,  some of the gunk was very difficult to remove. All the while, the other oven was getting hotter and hotter, doing it's thing.
As I scrubbed and scrubbed, it reminded me of two types of Christians. There are those, many of those, who are like someone cleaning a standard oven. These people are independent,  do-it-yourself-ers, who try again and again to clean up the gunky mess left in their spirits by a lifetime of sinful behavior.  They work and work, sweating and scrubbing, doing good deeds and trying so hard to make up for all the sins they've committed. The only difference is,  when you scrub an actual stove, the gunk comes off. When you try working your way to righteousness, you end up still grimy and unsatisfied, no better off than before you did all that work.
On the other hand,  you have the people who are more like someone cleaning a self-cleaning oven. These people close the door of their spirits,  and sit back comfortably while the Holy Spirit goes in and uses the Blood of Jesus to spotlessly scrub every last hint of sin and unrighteousness from their spirits. These people recognize the futility of all that independent scrubbing, knowing that the only way to truly become clean inside is to allow the Holy Spirit to do the work. The end result is a decidedly better-looking spirit, made wonderfully right in God's eyes! Maybe this is not that good an analogy, but that's what it looked like to me as I was scrubbing away at the oven. At any rate,  it reminded me that I must let the Holy Spirit do the cleaning in my spirit,  that my own work will never be enough.  God bless you!