Poop on the Wall....A Ministry Horror Story (Our 100th Post!)

Disclaimer: This post contains some disgusting content, so feel free to stop reading now if you are easily grossed out or offended.

As a pastor, I have the opportunity to serve the church in a multitude of ways that go beyond being a spiritual leader. Today, I had to do something that noone should have to do. Even though it is in very poor taste to post this type of stuff on our blog, I decided that I would share the story of my morning today.

This morning started out as any other day. I was in my office responding to emails and preparing my "To Do" list for the day when I heard someone come into the church. Our secretary greeted the visitor.

Since my office door was opened, I could hear what they were talking about. The man asked for the janitor. Veronica, our secretary, told him that the janitor was not in. The older man gave her an envelope and asked that she give it to the janitor. He then went on to tell her that he had been a part of a community single's group that uses our building on Tuesday nights, and that he had a bad case of diarrhea last night. Finally, he apologized for the mess he had made in the bathroom.

At this point, I was feeling really embarassed for him, and simultaneously thanking God that I had not gone out of my office to greet him. I am not sure I could have kept a straight face through the conversation.

After he left, I decided to check out the bathroom. This was my first mistake! We should have just called the janitor!! When I opened the door, it was like a wall of stink hit me in the face. At first glance, the bathroom did not look that bad. He had apparently tried to clean up with some paper towels, and it appeared that the garbage can that held those paper towels was the culprit for the stench.

I emptied the garbage and grabbed the Clorox disinfecting wipes and wiped the toilet, faucet handles, and door handles down. As I was leaving the bathroom, I looked back and noticed brown chunks on the wall outside of the stall. These chunks were located about 5 feet up the wall, and they were not pieces of chocolate!

To make a long story short, I dry-heaved my way through cleaning up the walls and then sprayed every surface in that bathroom down with Lysol disinfectant!

Isn't God good at keeping us humble? There was a silver lining though. After cleaning the bathroom, we opened the envelope that the man brought and found that it had $20 in it. Of course, I kept it!!!

That was probably the most disgusting thing I have ever had to do, and I have cleaned a few public bathrooms in my day.

I still have one burning question.....HOW DID HE GET POOP THAT HIGH UP ON THE WALL??? (Maybe some of you IBS sufferers can shed some light on the subject!)