It Rattles And It Washes

It goes on the spin like a small aircraft.

Everybody in this house has made the joke. Your son does an impression of it. Your husband said something about air traffic control on Tuesday and it was funny, genuinely, and you laughed.

And then you apologized.

That is the thing worth noticing. Not the joke. The reflex after it, which has happened perhaps fifteen times in a month, and which goes something like: I know, sorry, it was all there was.

Fifteen apologies, to people who live in your own house, about a machine that has washed everything they own since it arrived.

And here is what those fifteen apologies have quietly built: an agreement, in this household, that the machine is a bit of a shame. Nobody in the family started that. You built it, one sorry at a time, and everybody else has been politely going along with something you introduced.

You are a woman with a machine that works and not a woman who bought a bad one, and a noise from a working machine has never once been a complaint against the person who chose it.

Who hath despised the day of small things

There is a question in Zechariah asked to people looking at something unimpressive, and it is a sharp question.

For who hath despised the day of small things? for they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel with those seven. (Zechariah 4:10, King James Version)

Who hath despised the day of small things.

The setting is a rebuilt temple that was not as good as the old one, and there were people standing around making remarks about it, and God asks who exactly they think they are.

The building was going up. It was functioning. It was smaller and plainer than the previous one and it was actually being built, and that is the thing being sneered at.

You are living with something that works and being asked to feel sorry about it, and a functioning thing has never once been the correct object of anybody's disappointment. The Holy Spirit is the one present with a woman apologizing over a spin cycle, and Zechariah 4:10 asks the despising question about something that was actually being built.

And notice the direction of the question. It is asked against the despisers, not against the builders.

God is not consoling people for having a smaller temple. He is asking a sharp question of anybody who looked at a working thing and found it not good enough. The correction goes to the audience.

You have been playing the wrong part in that passage, and a woman who keeps apologizing has never once been the one the question in that verse was aimed at. The written word turns on the despising rather than on the small thing, and the Spirit of God is the one who moves a woman out of a role she was never cast in.

And then: they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand.

A plummet is a plumb line. It is the tool that says this wall is straight. The rejoicing in that verse is not about grandeur. It is about a builder holding a tool and the work being true.

You are looking at a wall that is straight rather than a wall that is grand, and a thing that does what it was built to do has never once been the lesser kind of good. The Holy Spirit is the one who lets a woman see a working machine as the good thing it is, and Zechariah 4:10 puts the joy on the plumb line.

The apologies are the only problem

Something practical, and it is an honest look at what those fifteen sentences have done.

Every apology is information. It tells the room how to hold a thing. When a woman apologizes for a machine, the room learns that the machine is something to be apologized for, and the room adjusts accordingly, without anybody deciding to.

The jokes are not the problem. The jokes are affection. Families make jokes about everything in a house, including things that cost a great deal.

You are the only person in this house treating that noise as a fault, and a family making jokes has never once been a family making a complaint. The written word asks its sharp question of the despisers and not of the builders, and the Spirit of God is the one who separates a joke from a judgment in a kitchen.

Now the second practical thing, and it is a single sentence and then silence.

Say once, in front of whoever is there: the noise is staying, it works, and I am not sorry about it anymore.

Say it lightly. This is not a speech and there is no need for a moment. And then, from that point, do not mention the noise again. When the joke comes, laugh at the joke and say nothing after it.

You are able to laugh at a joke and add nothing to it, and a woman who stops apologizing has never once been a woman who stopped being able to take a joke. The Holy Spirit is the one in the room while a habit gets set down, and Zechariah 4:10 refuses to let a working thing be despised.

And here is what happens over the next two weeks: the jokes carry on, because they are funny, and the apology shaped silence after them disappears, and inside a month nobody in that house thinks of the machine as anything other than loud.

Loud is a fact. Shameful was an addition, and it was added by one person.

You have been living beside a machine that never once complained about itself, and a household that washes everything it wears has never once been a household with anything to be sorry for. The Holy Spirit is the one in the kitchen while the spin cycle runs, and Zechariah 4:10 puts the rejoicing on a wall that is straight.