She Asked For An Hour And I Sent A Parcel

She was completely clear.

That is what makes this hard. She did not hint and she did not go round anything. She said, in words, that what she would really like is an hour with you.

And you sent something. It was well chosen and it was warm and she thanked you for it properly.

And then some months later she said it again, in almost the same words, and you sent something again.

The first one you can explain. You were in the middle of a difficult stretch and the sending was what you had and it was not nothing.

The second one you have not been able to explain to yourself at all, and it is the second one that has been sitting in you since.

There is a verse in James about saying a good thing to somebody instead of giving them what they actually asked for, and it ends in a question.

What doth it profit

Here it is.

And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? (James 2:16, King James Version)

The thing being said in that verse is a genuinely good thing.

Depart in peace. Be warmed and filled. That is not sarcasm and it is not contempt. Somebody is wishing somebody else well, warmly, and meaning it.

You are looking at a substitution made with real warmth, and James 2:16 has somebody say something genuinely kind rather than something cold. The Holy Spirit is the one who made the substitute a warm thing rather than a cruel one, and that is what makes the verse bite.

Now the phrase in the middle, which names what is wrong with it.

Those things which are needful to the body. There was a specific thing needed. It was known. It was nameable, and the person standing there could have named it, and something else was offered instead.

You have been offering something other than the thing that was named, and it is written that they gave not those things which are needful rather than that they gave nothing at all. The Spirit of God is the one who made the failure a substitution rather than an absence, and a substitution is a great deal harder to see from inside.

And then the question, which he leaves standing.

What doth it profit. He does not answer it. There is no verse afterward explaining it or softening it, and the question is left there in the open for the reader to sit in.

You are being asked a question rather than sentenced, and Scripture ends on what doth it profit rather than on a verdict about anybody. The Holy Spirit is the one who left it as a question, and a question can be answered honestly by somebody in a car.

What the second time meant

Now let me take the second one seriously, because it has been impossible to look at and it is what brought you here.

The first was a substitution made under pressure. Those happen and they are ordinary and nobody is on trial for one.

The second was made with the information. You knew what she had asked for, you knew what you had sent last time, and you did the same thing again.

You have been carrying a second one rather than a first, and it is written that the substitution is named rather than excused by the warmth of it. The Spirit of God is the one who does not let a person hide a second time inside a first, and He is not hiding it for you.

And here is what the second one probably was, held loosely because only you can say.

It was not a lack of wanting to see her. That is the explanation everybody fears in this position and it is very rarely the real one.

It is much more likely that an hour with her involves something an hour with most people does not. A subject, or a silence, or a thing that would come up, or a version of yourself that only appears in her company.

You have been avoiding a thing inside the hour rather than the hour, and the written word names what was needful rather than what was difficult. The Holy Spirit is the one who lets a person look at what is actually in a room, and it is nearly always one specific thing.

And a plain word about her, because it has not been said.

She asked twice. Most people do not ask twice. Asking the second time, in almost the same words, after having been sent something the first time, took her something.

You have been asked twice by somebody who found the first asking hard enough, and it is written that the need was nameable rather than vague. The Spirit of God is the one who knows what a second asking costs, and it costs more than the first by a long way.

Give her the hour

So here is what to do, and it is exactly what was asked for and nothing more than that.

Give her the hour. This week. Named, arranged, with a day on it.

Not a long weekend. Not a proper visit. Not something larger to make up for the two parcels, because larger is another substitution and she would feel it.

An hour. The thing she asked for, twice.

You are able to give the thing that was actually named, and James 2:16 names the needful thing rather than something better than it. The Holy Spirit is the one who keeps a person from overcorrecting, and overcorrecting here would be the third substitution.

And go with nothing in your hands.

No object. Not a small thing to take the edge off. Nothing to hand over at the beginning, because handing something over at the beginning is a way of putting an object into an hour that was asked to have none in it.

You are able to arrive empty handed, and it is written that the words were offered in place of the thing rather than alongside it. The Spirit of God is the one who gets somebody through a door with nothing, and this is the one occasion where nothing is the whole point.

And pick somewhere with no house in it.

A bench, a car, a path, a park. Not a kitchen, because a kitchen has jobs in it and you will find one, and not anywhere either of you can get up and be useful.

You are able to choose somewhere with nothing to do, and His word puts the needful thing in the hands rather than in the arrangements. The Holy Spirit is the one who is on a bench beside a path, and He is on it more readily than in most rooms.

And do not apologize for the two parcels.

Do not raise them. If she raises them, say something short and warm and go back to her. An apology would make the hour about you, and the hour was asked for twice by somebody who wanted it to be about the two of you.

You are able to leave the parcels entirely alone, and it is written that the question is what doth it profit rather than who should apologize. The Spirit of God is the one who keeps an hour from becoming a reckoning, and a reckoning would spend the whole of it.