I Tried And I Made A Mess Of It

It is still there, and you still look at it.

Not every day. But often enough. And whenever you do, the whole afternoon comes back, and so does the feeling in your chest that arrived at about the forty minute mark when you understood it was not going to come right.

That is what makes this different from an ordinary failed job. It is not a piece of wood any more. It has become a small permanent exhibit, and you are the only person in the house who visits it.

Let me put down the thing this whole article stands on, right at the top. Not knowing how is not a character flaw. What happened that afternoon is that a person who had never been shown attempted something and it did not work, and that is a completely ordinary event that happens to everybody, and it says nothing about who you are.

A just man falleth seven times

There is a proverb about this that is far more matter of fact than most people expect.

For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief. (Proverbs 24:16, King James Version)

Look at what it says about the just man. Not that he does not fall. That he falls seven times.

That is not one bad afternoon in a life. That is a pattern of falling, described plainly, and attached to the word just. The falling is inside the description of the good man, not outside it.

You have a Bible that puts repeated falling inside the definition of a just man, and one botched job has never once been able to move you out of that category. Proverbs 24:16 counts seven falls and still calls him just, and the Holy Spirit is the one who lets that read as company rather than as a low bar.

And notice the verb that follows. Riseth up again. Not gets it right next time. Not never falls again. Rises. Which is a description of getting off the floor, and nothing more heroic than that.

You are being asked to get up rather than to get it right, and rising after a failed attempt has never once required doing the job perfectly the second time. The Spirit of God is the one who separates a fall from a verdict, and it is written in Proverbs that the falling and the rising both belong to the same just man.

What it is, and what it is not

Here is the piece of work I actually want done tonight, and it is done with your mouth rather than your hands.

That botched thing has two lists attached to it, and only one of them is true.

What it is: a cupboard door that does not sit right. Two screw holes in the wrong place. A section of trim that is split. A wall with a patch on it that does not quite match. Those are facts, and they are small, and every one of them is fixable by somebody, eventually, for not very much.

What it is not: evidence about whether you are capable. Proof that you should not have tried. A reason not to attempt anything again. A thing your family thinks about. A statement about the kind of person who lives here.

You have been carrying a second list that was never true, and a split piece of trim has never once been able to say a single word about the person who split it. It is written in Proverbs 24:16 that the just man falls and rises repeatedly, and the Holy Spirit is the one who can hold a fact still while a person looks at it.

And the second list is the heavy one. Nobody in that house is carrying it. If you asked your family about it they would have to think for a second to remember which thing you meant.

Now the limit, and I say it here rather than in a footer. Sometimes the botched job is in a category that should never have been attempted, and if that is true here, say it plainly and move on. Never a gas appliance, never the breaker panel, never mains wiring, never a wall holding the building up, never a roof. Call a licensed professional and pay them properly. That is a fact about the job, not about you.

You are entirely right to hand it to somebody licensed now, and calling in a professional after an attempt has never once been an admission of anything except that the job needed one. The Holy Spirit is the one who gives a person calm about that phone call, and Scripture puts the rising rather than the never falling at the center of what a just man does.

Go and look at it and say both lists

So here is the ask, and it takes about two minutes.

Go and stand in front of the thing you botched, and say out loud what it is and what it is not.

Out loud. In the room. Both lists, in that order, in plain words.

This is a door that does not close properly. It is two holes in the wrong place. It is not proof that I cannot do things. It is not something my family thinks about. It is not a reason to stop.

You are able to stand in front of it and say two plain lists out loud, and naming a thing accurately has never once made it heavier. The Spirit of God is the one who is with a person in front of the thing they have been avoiding, and Proverbs 24:16 puts the falling and the rising in the same sentence about the same man.

It sounds simple. It works because the two lists have been fused since that afternoon, and they fuse silently, and nothing separates them except being said apart from each other out loud.

You do not have to fix it tonight. That is not the assignment and I do not want you to. Tonight is only the separating.

You have permission to look straight at your own worst attempt, and two minutes in front of a botched door has never once been beyond the strength of somebody God calls just. It is written in Proverbs that the just man rises again after each of seven falls, and the same Spirit who breathed that line is standing in the room with you.