It Is Not Finished Properly Yet

It was going to be finished when the edging was on.

Then the edging went on, and it turned out the corners needed doing properly, because an edging with rough corners is not really finished.

Then the corners got done, and you noticed the join at the back, which nobody would see, but you would know.

That is three lines. Three separate definitions of properly, each one arriving about a week after the last one was met, and every one of them felt like a genuine standard at the time.

I want to name the pattern rather than the corners, because the corners are not the subject.

The line moves.

It moves when you get close to it. Every time. And you have never once caught it moving, because at the moment it moves it does not feel like a line moving, it feels like noticing something you had missed.

That is what makes it so good at what it does. It arrives as diligence.

And underneath, doing the same job it was always doing: making sure the thing stays here, in this house, with you, in a state where nobody has to receive it.

Because a finished thing has to go somewhere. An unfinished one has a legitimate reason to stay.

According to that a man hath

Paul writes about a collection, to people who were embarrassed about how little they could give, and he says something that settles this whole question.

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)

According to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not.

That is a rule about what a gift is measured against. Not against what it could have been. Not against a finished version that exists in somebody's head. Against what is actually there.

And the condition at the front is the only condition. If there be first a willing mind. That is all that is required for the accepting.

You have a willing mind and Scripture says that is the whole condition, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 measures a gift against what exists rather than against what was intended. The Holy Spirit is the one who takes a line about an awkward collection and lays it down on a front room with something unfinished in a basket.

And notice the second half, which is the one that does the work here. Not according to that he hath not.

The unfinished corners are a thing you have not. They are not on the table, and the verse says they are not being counted.

You are not measured against the version you have not made, and it is already settled in the written word that what is absent is excluded from the reckoning. His Spirit is the one who says according to that a man hath over a woman whose line moved again last Tuesday.

The line will keep moving

Now let me be plain about the future, because this is the part that decides what happens next.

There is no version of this where the line stops.

If you finish the join at the back, you will notice something else within about a week. That is not a prediction about that object. It is a description of a mechanism, and the mechanism has run three times on this one thing already.

You are accepted according to what is actually there, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 excludes what a person does not have from the reckoning by name. The Holy Spirit is the one who ends a chase that had no end anywhere in it.

So there is no arriving. There is only handing it over while the line is still ahead of you, which is where the line will always be.

And this: the state of it is not a measure of you, and it never has been. It is a thing in a basket with an edging on and corners that could be better.

You are not going to arrive at properly, and heaven has never once made a finished state the condition on a gift. 2 Corinthians 8:12 accepts according to what is there, and the Spirit of God is the one who ends a chase that has no end in it.

And do not do one more thing to it first. Not the join, not fifteen minutes, not the small legitimate improvement that would take no time at all. That is the line moving one final time on its way out of the door.

You have permission to hand it over exactly as it is, and this is yours: the willing mind was the only condition named. It is written in 2 Corinthians 8:12 that it is accepted according to that a man hath, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes the current state acceptable rather than the finished one.

Give it in the state it is in

So here is the ask, and the timing is the whole of it.

This week, give it away in the state it is in right now.

Not after the join. Not after fifteen minutes on Saturday. Whatever state it is in as you read this is the state it goes over in.

You are handing over what exists rather than what was intended, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 measures a gift against exactly that. The Holy Spirit is the one who makes the current state acceptable when the finished one has never once arrived.

And say nothing about what is unfinished. No listing what was still to be done, and no remark about what another week would have got finished.

Here, and their name.

They will not see an unfinished thing. They will see a thing. That is the part that will not be believed and it is true, and the corners that have been lived with for a month are entirely invisible to everybody who did not make it.

And start something else this week in twenty minutes, badly, so that there is something new in the basket and this one is not the only object your line has to live on.

You are covered while an unfinished thing crosses a room, and 2 Corinthians 8:12 is the ground under that. The written word excludes what a person does not have from the reckoning entirely, and the Spirit of God is present in a front room where somebody is handing something over early.