The Tank at a Quarter

The gauge on that tank has been lying to you since 1998 and you know exactly how it lies, which means you know it is worse than a quarter.

You went out after dark to look, which is a foolish way to read a gauge and is what a man does when he does not want anybody at the window watching him look.

Friday. That is what the woman on the phone said in October and she was not being difficult about it. Book by Friday for the run before the cold, or wait for whenever they are next up this way, and up this way is a long lane and a bad bend and they do not come often.

You counted at the kitchen table. Then you counted again the next morning, because a number sometimes looks different in daylight, and it did not.

There is a way you carry this that your wife has learned to read. You go a bit quieter and you find outside jobs. She has not asked. She will, on Thursday, and you have not yet decided what you are going to say.

The stove is fine. There is wood, and there is always wood, and the kitchen will stay warm whatever happens. It is the rest of the house and it is your mother's room at the back and it is January that you are actually looking at.

A gauge at a quarter, and a Friday, and a bad bend on a long lane.

The psalm has a hand in it, and it opens

There is a couplet in Psalm 145 that is about as plain as Scripture gets.

The eyes of all wait upon thee; and thou givest them their meat in due season. Thou openest thine hand, and satisfiest the desire of every living thing.Psalm 145:15-16

There is no technique in it. Nobody in the verse does anything to trigger the opening. The eyes wait, and the hand opens, and that is the whole mechanism as far as the psalm is concerned.

And look at the range of it. Every living thing. Not the deserving, not the organized, not the ones who planned better in the summer. Every living thing includes the stock in the shed and the birds on the wire and a man standing out by a tank at nine at night with a torch.

You are inside that verse and not outside it. I am not putting my own confidence over you here. Scripture says Thou openest Thine hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing, Psalm 145:16, and the Holy Spirit is the one who carries a line like that across a dark yard to a man who did not want to be seen looking.

Nothing here costs anything

I want to say this plainly because this is the category where people get sold things.

Nobody on this page is going to tell you that a gift releases a supply. There is no amount you can send anywhere that moves a delivery lorry. Nothing here has a toll booth in front of it and nothing here ever will.

And I am not going to give you advice. Not about the oil, not about the money, not about what you should have done in August. You have farmed a long time and you have run this house through worse than a quarter tank, and a stranger suggesting an approach would be an insult dressed as help.

You have not been left to arrange this by yourself. Scripture says the Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him in truth, Psalm 145:18, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes near mean near rather than a nice general truth about God.

Say the number out loud

You have counted twice and you have not said it once. Scripture puts the asking in the mouth of ordinary people about ordinary supply, Matthew 6:11, and the Holy Spirit is not embarrassed by a domestic figure.

There is a particular kind of quiet that comes over a man about a small practical need, and it is worse than the quiet about a big one. He will pray about his wife's health without a moment's hesitation and feel ridiculous praying about heating oil, because oil is a thing a man ought to have handled.

That is not humility. That is pride in working clothes, and I say that with affection, having worn the same coat.

Jesus put bread in the model prayer. Daily bread, the most ordinary domestic supply there is, right between the kingdom and forgiveness. He did not think it beneath the conversation and He did not attach an apology to it.

You are welcome to bring the exact figure and the exact date. Scripture says be careful for nothing, but in every thing by prayer and supplication let your requests be made known unto God, Philippians 4:6, and the Holy Spirit is the one who gets a man past the embarrassment far enough to say a number in his own kitchen.

What Thursday is actually about

And when she asks on Thursday, tell her.

Not the whole worry, if you do not want to. The number. The Friday. The fact that you went out with a torch.

You have been protecting her from it, and you have been doing that for thirty years, and it is one of the reasons she married you. But there is a point where protecting a person from a fact turns into leaving them out of a house they also live in.

You have a wife who has stood in worse than this beside you. Scripture says two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their labor, Ecclesiastes 4:9, and the Holy Spirit has been running that arrangement in your kitchen since before either of you noticed.