I Promised I Would Finish It

You said it out loud, which is the difficulty.

If you had only thought it, this would be a project. Because you said it, in a particular week, to a particular person, with a month attached to it, it is something else now.

It would be done by June. That is the sentence, or one like it. And June went, and then another June went, and the sentence is still standing there.

So now approaching the room means two things at once. It means the work, which is ordinary and doable. And it means walking past your own sentence, which is not ordinary at all.

And here is what nobody tells a man in this position. The order is wrong. You have been trying to do the work in order to clear the promise, and that never happens, because the promise is heavier than the work and it gets to the room before you do.

The apology comes first. Not because you owe a performance to anybody, but because a sentence standing between a man and a room has to be dealt with before the room is reachable.

You are a man who is allowed back into that room, and a promise that went past its date has never once been a wall between you and the work.

As far as the east is from the west

There is a line in the hundred and third psalm about distance, and the choice of directions in it is deliberate.

As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. (Psalm 103:12, King James Version)

As far as the east is from the west.

North and south have poles. Travel far enough north and you start going south. East and west have no meeting point at all, and a man walking east never once arrives at west.

So the distance chosen is the only one available with no end to it, and the psalm is not being poetic by accident.

You have a distance put between you and something that was never once measured in a way that could be crossed back over. Psalm 103:12 picks the one direction with no meeting point, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes that a fact about a man rather than a nice line.

And the verb is removed. Not forgiven while remaining in place. Removed, which is a word about relocation, and the thing relocated is put at a distance that does not close.

That is not about a project and I am not going to pretend it is. It is about a man and what stands against him, and a sentence said in a particular week is exactly the sort of thing that stands.

You were never required to carry a thing that has already been relocated, and something removed has never once been something you have to keep walking past. The Spirit of God is the one who did the removing, and the written word uses the one distance that has no other side to it.

The apology is the door, not the penance

So here is the practical part, and it is about sequence.

The apology is not a punishment and it is not a performance and it is not the thing you owe.

It is simply the mechanism that takes the sentence out of the doorway. While the promise sits unaddressed, the room has a condition attached to it, and men do not enter rooms with conditions on them.

You have a sentence in a doorway that can be moved in nine seconds, and an apology has never once been the same thing as a penance. Psalm 103:12 removes rather than requires, and the Holy Spirit is the one who is present when a man says a short true thing to somebody he lives with.

And here is the shape of it, which matters, because the wrong shape makes everything worse.

It is not: I am so sorry, I am useless, I never finish anything. That is not an apology, it is a request for reassurance, and it puts the other person to work comforting you.

It is: I said it would be done by June, and it was not, and I am sorry. That is the whole thing. Nine seconds.

You are able to say a short true sentence without turning it into a request, and an apology has never once needed to be a conversation about your character. The Spirit of God is the one who keeps a man from converting a plain thing into a performance, and Psalm 103:12 removes a thing at a distance rather than dwelling on it.

And here is the second half, and it is why this article does not end at the apology.

Say it and then go and work on it, the same evening. Fifteen minutes. Not to prove anything and not to make the apology credible.

You have fifteen minutes available on the same evening as the sentence, and work done after an apology has never once been the payment for it. Psalm 103:12 puts the removing on God's side of it, and the Holy Spirit is the one in that room afterward while a man does a quarter of an hour.

Nine seconds, then fifteen minutes

Here is the assignment and it has two halves and they belong to the same evening.

First, go and say one sentence to the person you promised.

I said it would be done by June, and it was not, and I am sorry. Then stop. Do not explain what happened. Do not describe the year. Do not say and I am going to get onto it, because that is a second promise and the first one is what you are standing in.

You have nine seconds and one plain sentence tonight, and an apology with no promise attached has never once been half an apology. Psalm 103:12 removes as far as the east is from the west, and the Holy Spirit is the one standing there while a short true thing gets said.

Then, the same evening, go and do fifteen minutes on it.

Not because you said you would. You did not say you would. That is the point, and it is what keeps this from being another promise.

Fifteen minutes, timed, then stop. Whatever the next step actually is.

The apology takes the sentence out of the doorway. The fifteen minutes proves the room is enterable. Neither one of those is the finish, and neither one is owed to anybody, and both of them are available tonight.