I Made It Fifty And Burned Out By Thursday

You have done this four times this year and it always goes the same way.

Monday you read ten pages and it is lovely. Tuesday you read thirty, because it was going well and there is no reason to stop at ten when it is going well. Wednesday you read fifty and it is nearly midnight when you look up.

And then Thursday there is nothing. Not a decision to stop. You just do not pick it up, and Friday the same, and by the following Wednesday the book is somewhere under something and the whole thing has gone quiet again.

Four times this year. Four books, all abandoned somewhere past page ninety, all of them going beautifully right up to the point where they stopped.

Two things are not coming here, and you have met them both.

Nobody is handing you a list. Not a title, not an author, not a genre, and no shelf of what a woman ought to have read by now. Being handed one has never once opened a book, and mostly it adds one more thing to be behind on.

And nobody is saying one word about your phone. You know about the phone. Everybody knows. Being told again by a stranger returns nothing at all.

What I want to look at is Wednesday, because Thursday gets blamed and Wednesday is where it happened.

The fifty pages did not build anything. It spent something, and Thursday is the bill.

He that gathered much had nothing over

There is a detail in Exodus 16 about the manna that is easy to read past, and it is one of the strangest sentences in the chapter.

And when they did mete it with an omer, he that had gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; they gathered every man according to his eating. (Exodus 16:18, King James Version)

Read it slowly, because it says something that should not be possible.

Some people went out and gathered a lot. Some gathered a little. And when it was measured, the one with a lot had nothing left over and the one with a little had no shortage. The extra effort produced no extra supply.

That is not a lesson about generosity or sharing. Nothing in the verse mentions redistribution. It says the measuring itself came out even, which means the surplus did not exist.

And the next verses go further. What was kept overnight bred worms and stank. The extra was not merely useless, it went bad, and the going bad was the standing rule for six days a week.

You are not behind for having gathered a measure, and fifty pages on a Wednesday has never once put anything in the bank. Exodus 16:18 has the one who gathered much end with nothing over and the one who gathered little end with no lack, and the Holy Spirit is the one saying that over a book abandoned at page ninety.

There is one more phrase in it and it is the one that decides tonight.

They gathered every man according to his eating. The measure was set by the appetite of the day, not by ambition and not by what a strong morning made possible.

You have a measure set by the day rather than by the good evening, and a strong Tuesday has never once entitled anybody to a bigger Wednesday. It is written they gathered every man according to his eating, the amount is fixed to the day and never to the enthusiasm, and the Spirit of God is saying that plainly here.

The fifty is a withdrawal, not a deposit

Here is the mechanism, and it explains why this has happened four times.

Reading in the evening runs on a small fund, and the fund is not enthusiasm. It is a mix of attention and unhurriedness, and both of them refill overnight at a fixed rate that nothing you do speeds up.

Ten pages costs about a quarter of an evening's fund and leaves the rest. Fifty pages costs the whole of it plus some of tomorrow's, and the borrowing happens quietly, and it does not present a bill until two days later.

Which means Thursday is not a failure of will. Thursday is Wednesday's invoice arriving, and it always arrives, and it arrives whether you are pleased with Wednesday or not.

You are paying an invoice on Thursday and not failing at anything, and a beautiful Wednesday has never once been the same thing as progress. Exodus 16:18 has extra gathering produce no extra supply at all, and the Holy Spirit is present with a woman who has done this four times and blamed herself four times.

And there is a second thing under it, and it is the reason the fifty is so hard to refuse.

Reading ten pages when it is going well feels like leaving money on the table. There is a real pull in it, and the pull has a sentence attached: I might not want to tomorrow, so I should take it while I have it.

That sentence is exactly the one Exodus 16 forbids. The people who kept extra overnight were doing precisely that, and the reason it bred worms was to teach that tomorrow's supply is not a thing anybody has to secure in advance.

You have tomorrow's portion already provided for, and taking extra tonight has never once made tomorrow more likely. The written word has what was kept overnight breed worms and stink, the lesson is that the day is supplied on the day, and His Spirit is the one who keeps a person to the measure.

Exactly ten, and exactly ten again

So here is the assignment, and the word exactly is doing all of the work.

Read exactly ten pages tonight and stop, and if you want more tomorrow read exactly ten again.

Exactly. Not ten and then see. Not ten unless it is going really well. Ten, counted, and then closed, on Monday and on Tuesday and on the good Wednesday when everything in you says take thirty.

Here is why the number never moves.

A number that moves is not a measure, it is a mood, and a mood cannot be relied on across a bad week. Ten every night is available on the worst Thursday of the year, and a thing available on the worst day is the only thing that lasts.

And ten on a good night is what leaves the fund intact, which is what makes tomorrow's ten easy, which is how a book gets finished by somebody who has abandoned four of them at page ninety.

You are able to close a book at ten on a night that is going well, and stopping at the measure has never once been the same thing as leaving something behind. Exodus 16:18 says he that had gathered much had nothing over, and the Holy Ghost is the one present with a woman shutting a book at ten pages on a Wednesday.

The pull to take more is going to be strongest on the third good night, and that is the night this is really about. Close it at ten. The fifty is not a gift, it is a loan at a bad rate.

You have a measure that holds on a bad week, and a night you refused to overreach has never once been a night wasted. It is written and he that gathered little had no lack, the even measure is the whole miracle in that verse, and the Spirit of God is measuring here.