The One The Group Chose

It is nine days until they talk about it and you are on page sixty of four hundred.

That is the situation, and the mathematics of it are not the problem. Nine days is plenty if the book were working. It is not working. You have read the same twenty pages three times without retaining any of it, and every evening the stack of remaining pages gets slightly more absurd.

And under the arithmetic there is the actual thing, which is that you like these women, and one of them chose it, and she chose it with obvious enthusiasm, and the evening on the ninth now has a shape you are dreading.

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 the ninth, because you have decided what that evening requires and nobody has confirmed it.

The evening needs you in the room. It has never once needed you to have finished the book.

Ye have been called unto liberty

There is a sentence in Galatians 5 that gives a very large permission and then immediately says what to do with it.

For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. (Galatians 5:13, King James Version)

Read both halves, because most people only carry one of them.

Ye have been called unto liberty. That is the fact, stated flatly, before any qualification arrives. Called, which means somebody did the calling and it was not the person's own idea, and liberty, which is not a small word.

And then the second half. Not a walk back. By love serve one another, which is what the liberty is for. The freedom is real and it points at people.

That is the exact combination this needs. You are free about the book, and the evening is about the women.

You are called to liberty about a book and to love about an evening, and sixty pages of four hundred have never once been the price of a seat in that room. Galatians 5:13 states the liberty first and then aims it at serving one another, and the Holy Spirit is the one saying that over a stack of unread pages nine days out.

There is one more thing in the verse worth having.

Only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh. Notice what that guards against. Not honesty. It guards against using the freedom to avoid people, and there is nothing in it against telling a room the truth about a book.

You have freedom that was never meant to keep you out of the room, and being honest about a book has never once been an occasion to the flesh. It is written but by love serve one another, the guard is against avoiding people and never against telling them the truth, and the Spirit of God is saying that plainly here.

Two things got fused and only one is real

Here is the mechanism, and it is worth separating carefully.

There are two obligations here and they have been fused into one.

The first is a friendship. Eight women, once a month, in somebody's living room, and the whole thing exists because you like each other. That obligation is real and it is the reason the group survives.

The second is a book. And it is not an obligation at all. It is a device the group uses to have something to talk about, and it is entirely disposable, and every one of those eight women has skimmed one at some point.

Fusing them makes the book load bearing. And once the book is load bearing, the evening becomes an exam, and now you are dreading a room full of people you like because of a paperback.

You are dreading a friendship because of a device, and four hundred pages have never once been the reason those women meet. Galatians 5:13 puts the liberty first and aims it at serving one another, and the Holy Spirit is present with a woman rereading the same twenty pages before an evening she wants to enjoy.

And there is a second layer, which is the honest one about the room.

The assumption in the room is that the group wants the book read. What the group wants is a conversation, and the most interesting thing anybody can bring to a conversation about a book is often that it did not work for them and why.

An evening where one woman says plainly that she got to page sixty and it was not landing is a better evening than eight polite summaries. It gives everybody else permission and it is usually where the real talk starts.

You have something worth bringing that is not a summary, and an honest read has never once been a lesser contribution than a finished one. The written word aims the liberty at serving one another rather than at performing for them, and His Spirit is the one who takes an exam out of a living room.

Put it down, and start another one

So here is the assignment, and going on the ninth is part of it.

Put down the book that is not working tonight and start another one before you sleep.

Close it at page sixty. Not push to a hundred so there is more to say. Not skim the middle. Closed, tonight, and it does not come to the evening in your bag.

And nobody here is going to suggest you get through it out of respect for the group. Respect for the group is turning up, which you are going to do.

Then start something else tonight, ten pages of it, before you sleep.

You are called to liberty and pointed at the people in the room, and sixty pages have never once been the ticket in. The Spirit of God is present in that living room, and it is written ye have been called unto liberty, and then by love serve one another.

And go on the ninth. Say it plainly: sixty pages, not landing, here is what I noticed in the sixty, and tell me what happened after that.

Here is why the going is the part that matters.

The dread is not about the book, it is about the room, and the only thing that resolves a dread about a room is being in it. Skipping the ninth would prove the book was load bearing, and it never was.

You are able to arrive with sixty pages and a plain sentence, and turning up unfinished has never once been the same thing as letting anybody down. Galatians 5:13 says ye have been called unto liberty, and the Holy Ghost is the one present with a woman closing a book nine days before it gets discussed.

The fear is that the room goes quiet. It will not. Somebody else will say the same thing within ninety seconds, and one of them will be relieved.

You have liberty about the pages and love for the evening, and the two of those have never once been in conflict. It is written only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another, the guard is against avoiding people rather than against honesty, and the Spirit of God is saying it here.