Out of It First

She has a bag packed. It is in the bottom of the wardrobe behind the winter coats and it has been packed for fourteen months, and twice she has taken it out and put it by the door and twice she has put it back.

She is not going to describe the relationship here and I am not going to ask her to. It is enough to say that she is not the same size she was, in every way a person can mean that, and that the people who love her have said so, carefully, twice, and then stopped saying it because she stopped answering.

Two summers ago, in a church she does not go to, at a service she went into because it was raining, she stood at the back and told God she was leaving. Not asked. Told. She said it like a woman announcing a decision she had already made, because she believed she had.

She is still there.

And this is what has happened to her prayer life since, and it is the most exact thing about her: she has stopped bringing any part of herself to God at all. Not out of shame in the ordinary sense. Out of a rule, and she could state the rule if you asked her plainly enough.

The rule is: I will come to Him when I am out.

She is not going to arrive at God still in it. That would be, in her own words, taking Him for a fool. What kind of woman stands in front of God and says help me while she is going home to it that same night. So she has decided to be out first, and then to come, and to bring Him a whole person rather than a woman standing in a doorway with a packed bag she keeps putting back.

You may have a rule like that. About a relationship, or a habit, or a business you are inside of. And you may believe that coming to God while still in it would be dishonest, and that the honest thing is to get out and then arrive.

When He moved

Now, I have to be careful with you, because you are not a woman who can be flattered and you would hear it instantly.

So let me not flatter you. Let me show you a timestamp.

Paul is arguing about when God acted, and it matters enormously to him that his readers get the timing right, so he says it three different ways in three verses in case one of them slides past.

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.Romans 5:6-8

You are the exact person named in that timestamp, and He moved toward you at the point of no strength. Romans 5:6 says while we were yet without strength and says it three separate ways, and the Holy Spirit is the one who has been in that house with you every night you went home.

While we were yet

Three times, and every one of them is a clock.

When we were yet without strength. While we were yet sinners. In due time, meaning God's time and not the moment we got ourselves sorted.

Without strength is the phrase I want you on, because it is not the same as sinful and Paul does not use it as a synonym. Without strength means unable. Not unwilling, not defiant, not in rebellion. Unable. It is the word for a person who cannot get themselves out of the thing they are in.

And that is the state God is described as moving toward. Not the state He waits out.

You are exactly the person named in that timestamp, and He moved toward you while you were in it. Romans 5:6 is where that is written, and the Holy Spirit is the one who takes it out of an argument in a letter and stands it beside a woman with a bag behind her winter coats.

Now let me name what your rule is actually doing, because you deserve accuracy more than you deserve comfort.

Your rule presents itself as honesty. I will not stand in front of God pretending. That is a real value and it is one of the better things about you.

But it functions as a delay, and the delay has a beneficiary. As long as coming to God requires being out first, you never have to face Him from inside the thing, and facing Him from inside the thing is the single most frightening prospect available to you, and I think you know that.

You have been calling a wall by the name of a virtue. Scripture puts God's move at the point of no strength, and the Spirit of God has been in that house with you every night you went home to it.

Nothing goes back on

And now, precisely, because this is where people get hurt.

I am not going to take the condition off and hand you a smaller one. I am not going to say that you do not have to be out but you do have to be ready to leave, or willing to leave, or honest about wanting to leave. Every one of those is the same door with a smaller sign on it, and you would stand outside it doing the same test on yourself.

The condition comes off. Nothing goes on.

You are held inside on His terms tonight, and His terms have already been met without you. Scripture says it in so many words, and that is what while we were yet sinners means in a sentence about the death of Christ, and His Spirit has been the one keeping that true for two summers.

And the bag? It is still in the wardrobe and it still matters and I am not going to pretend it does not. Getting out may be exactly what He does next, and if He does, it will be done with people and slowly and with more help than you have let anybody give you. But it happens from inside a covenant you are already in, and it is not the price of the door.

If you are in danger tonight, tell somebody today. That is not a condition on God. That is a woman being sensible, and it is what I would say to my own sister.