I Said A Bigger Number

You said a bigger number.

Not much bigger. The kind of bigger that sounds plausible, that would not be questioned, that sits comfortably between what you paid and what a person might expect.

And it came out before you had decided anything. That is the part that has been hardest to get hold of. There was no moment of choosing to lie. There was a question, and then there was an answer, and the answer was wrong, and you were as surprised as anybody.

And then the conversation moved on and she never thought about it again.

And you have thought about it every day since Tuesday.

Not because it was serious. It was not serious. Nobody was harmed and nothing turns on it and a person could be told the truth tomorrow and it would change nothing about anything.

It is because of what it seems to say about you. That is the whole of the weight. Not the sentence. What the sentence appears to reveal.

You are a woman who said one wrong number and not a woman who is dishonest, and a sentence said out of embarrassment has never once been the character of the person who said it.

Speak every man truth with his neighbor

There is an instruction in Ephesians about truthfulness, and the reason attached to it is not the reason people expect.

Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another. (Ephesians 4:25, King James Version)

For we are members one of another.

That is the reason he gives. Not because lying is forbidden and God is watching. Because of what people are to each other: parts of one body, connected, so that a false thing said between two people puts a small wrong join in something that is supposed to fit.

That is a very different motive from fear, and it changes what the correcting is for.

You are being asked to repair a join rather than to confess a crime, and a wrong number said to a neighbor has never once made a woman into a criminal. The Holy Spirit is the one present with somebody who has been carrying a sentence since Tuesday, and Ephesians 4:25 gives connection as the reason rather than judgment.

And notice the instruction itself: putting away lying.

Putting away is the language of clothes and of habits. It is what a person does with a coat, or with a practice. It is not the language of a courtroom and there is no sentence being passed anywhere in that verse.

You are putting something down rather than being found guilty of it, and a small false sentence set aside has never once required a trial first. The written word says put away, which is what a person does with something they are simply not going to carry, and the Spirit of God is the one who makes the putting down possible.

And then speak every man truth with his neighbor. Present tense, ongoing, the next sentence rather than the last one.

The verse is aimed forward. It is interested in what gets said from here rather than in a full accounting of what was said before.

You are being aimed at the next sentence and not at the last one, and a verse about speaking truth has never once required a review of everything already said. The Holy Spirit is the one who keeps a woman from turning a repair into an inquiry, and Ephesians 4:25 points forward on purpose.

The correction is smaller than the carrying

Something practical, and it is a comparison worth making honestly.

Carrying it costs something every day. It has cost since Tuesday. It comes back at odd moments, and it will come back every time that neighbor is seen for some months, and every time it comes back it will be slightly larger than the thing itself.

Correcting it costs about eleven seconds.

One sentence, said in a doorway or over a fence or on a phone, and then the subject moves and neither of you ever refers to it again.

You are choosing between eleven seconds and several months, and a correction made out loud has never once cost more than the carrying it ends. The written word points at the next sentence rather than at an audit, and the Spirit of God is the one who makes a short sentence possible where a long one is not needed.

Now, how to say it, because the wrong version makes it worse.

The wrong version is the explained version. I said this and actually it was that, because I was a bit embarrassed, and I do not know why I said it, and it was silly of me. That version turns eleven seconds into a scene and asks the other person to manage your feelings about it.

The right version is: I told you a bigger number the other day. It was actually this. I do not know why I said it.

Three sentences, and the third one is optional, and then stop.

You are able to correct a thing without turning it into a confession, and a short flat sentence has never once needed an apology wrapped around it to be honest. The Holy Spirit is the one in the doorway while it gets said, and Ephesians 4:25 aims at plain speaking rather than at ceremony.

And she will say something ordinary. She will say oh right, or she will not really remember, or she will say she does the same thing, and that will be the end of it and the join will be right.

You have the machine in that kitchen washing everything this house wears, and a working appliance has never once been made worse by what anybody was told it cost. The Holy Spirit is the one present while an eleven second thing gets finished, and Ephesians 4:25 points at the next true sentence rather than at an audit.