I Could Not Get To The Middle One

There were three of them and you could reach one.

That is the arithmetic and it is worth stating without any softening, because the softened version is what has been running all week and it is not helping.

The cheapest one was within reach. The middle one was not, not really, not without the kind of rearranging that costs something elsewhere for four months. And the good one was in a different conversation altogether.

So the choice was made. And it was not really a choice, and that is the part that stings.

Because a choice implies alternatives, and there was one option and two things you looked at. And there is something about having looked at them that has stayed, and it is not about the machine at all.

It is about having stood in front of a middle option and having had to walk past it.

And what has been sitting underneath all week is a sentence that has never been said out loud, and it goes roughly: I could not even get to the middle one.

You are a woman who gave what was there and not a woman who fell short, and a household measured by what it had has never once been measured by what it did not.

According to that a man hath

There is a sentence Paul writes about giving, and it is the most precise thing in the Bible about being measured.

For if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not. (2 Corinthians 8:12, King James Version)

Accepted according to that a man hath.

The measure is what is there. Not what was hoped for, not what a better month would have contained, not what somebody else in the same street had available. What is actually in the hand of the person at the moment the thing is done.

You are being measured by what was in your hand and not by what was missing from it, and a household with a limited amount has never once been assessed against an amount it did not have. The Holy Spirit is the one present with a woman who has been comparing herself to a middle option, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 says according to that a man hath and then rules out the other measure by name.

And then the second half, which is the one to take to the kitchen: and not according to that he hath not.

He says it twice, in two directions, because people do not believe it the first time. It is accepted according to what is there. It is not accepted according to what is not there.

That is an explicit exclusion of the exact measurement that has been running all week.

You have been using the one measure that Scripture rules out by name, and a gap between what a person had and what they wanted has never once been the scale God was weighing on. The written word rules out the second measure explicitly, and the Spirit of God is the one who takes a scale out of a woman's kitchen.

And the first clause is worth having too: if there be first a willing mind.

The thing that qualifies a person in that verse is willingness. Not capacity. The willing mind comes first in the sentence, and everything afterward is measured against what that willing mind actually had to work with.

You have a willing mind and a limited amount and that is the whole of what the verse asks for, and a woman who did what she could has never once been short of the qualification. The Holy Spirit is the one who reads a decision the way that verse does, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 puts the willingness first and the amount second.

What the middle one was actually for

Something practical, and it is a question worth answering honestly. What would the middle one have done that the cheapest one is not doing?

It would have washed clothes. So does this one. It would have lasted longer, possibly, and possibly not, and nobody knows. It would have been quieter. Those are the real differences and they are worth something and they are not nothing.

But that is not why it is being thought about at eleven at night. Nobody lies awake over a decibel level.

It is being thought about because standing in front of three things and being able to reach one of them was an experience, and the experience said something, and the something has been carried home and put in the kitchen.

You were bringing home a machine and an experience and only one of them is in that kitchen, and an afternoon of looking at things has never once had the right to describe the household you went home to. The written word measures what is in the hand and refuses the other measure, and the Spirit of God is the one who separates a machine from an afternoon.

Now the second practical thing, and it is short.

Go and stand in front of it and say out loud: this is what I had.

Not this is all I had, which is a different sentence with a sigh in it. This is what I had. Flat, plain, present tense, a statement about a fact rather than about a shortfall.

You are able to say a plain sentence about what was actually there, and a fact stated without a sigh in it has never once been the same sentence as a complaint. The Holy Spirit is the one in the kitchen while it gets said, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 makes what a person hath the entire measure.

And then run something through it. The machine is the answer to a question that was asked in a difficult week, and it is answering it, several times a day, without opinion.

You have a working answer standing in your kitchen to a question a hard week asked, and a machine that runs several times a day has never once been the wrong answer to it. The Holy Spirit is the one present while it runs, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 measures by what was in the hand.