I Kept The Empty Pot

The pot is still there.

You threw the plant out. That was over a year ago now, and you remember doing it, and you remember being fairly matter of fact about it.

And then you washed the pot out and put it back on the sill.

Which is a strange thing to do, and you have never once examined it, because it happened in about four seconds and nobody was watching and there was no reason to think about it again.

But it has been standing there with nothing in it for a year, in the best spot in the room, and you have dusted around it.

So here is the question I would gently put, and it is not about the pot.

What have you been keeping that space open for?

This one thing I do

Paul writes a line in Philippians that gets quoted as though it were about ambition, and it is not.

Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before. (Philippians 3:13, King James Version)

This one thing I do.

You are being handed a life that runs on one thing at a time, and a single small act has never once been too little to be the thing you do. Philippians 3:13 says this one thing I do, and the Holy Spirit is the one who says that over a man who has dusted around an empty pot for a year.

Look at the size of what Paul commits to. One thing. Not a program. Not a rebuilt life. One.

And look at what he says about the past, because it is precise. Forgetting those things which are behind. Not denying them. Not claiming they did not happen. Forgetting, in the sense of no longer reaching back for them.

That empty pot is a reach back. Not a dramatic one. A small standing one, kept in the best light in the room.

You have been reaching backward with something you never once decided to keep, and four seconds at a sink a year ago has never once bound you to anything. The Spirit of God is what makes that plain without making it a shame, and Philippians 3 is where the forgetting is written down.

What an empty pot is actually doing

Now the practical half, and it is short.

An empty pot in a good spot does one of two things, and only you know which.

It is either a placeholder, which means some part of you kept the space open on purpose, and that is a hopeful act that never got finished.

You have been holding a space open in the best light in your house, and that has never once been the behavior of a man who had given up on it. Philippians 3:13 reaches forth to the things before, and the Holy Spirit is the one who reads a kept space generously.

Or it is a monument, which means it stands there as a small daily record that something did not work out, and you walk past it several times a day.

Most likely it started as the first one and became the second one, because that is what happens to a placeholder nobody fills.

You are standing in front of something that changed meaning without anybody deciding it, and a year of drift has never once been the same as a year of choosing. The Holy Spirit is the one who says that without laying a charge, and Philippians 3:13 reaches forward rather than reading the record.

You are not obliged to know which one it has been, and a year of not deciding has never once been counted as a year of refusing. What is written in Philippians 3:13 reaches forth rather than auditing what is behind, and the Holy Spirit is the one who lets a man skip the diagnosis and go straight to the doing.

And here is the thing I actually want to give you, because it is the part that unlocks it.

Either answer is fine, and both answers have the same next move, and the next move takes ninety seconds.

Fill it, or move it off the sill. Today.

Fill it and the placeholder gets to have been a placeholder. Move it and the monument comes down. Either way the year ends, and it ends by an action rather than by a decision about what the year meant.

You have two good options and no wrong one, and a year has never once required understanding before it was allowed to close. Philippians 3:13 does one thing rather than settling the account behind it, and the Spirit of God is the one who lets a man move first.

You are able to end this with your hands rather than with your understanding, and ninety seconds has never once been too small to close a year. The Spirit of God is the one who moves a man before he has finished working out what he felt, and Philippians 3 is the ground under the reaching forward.

No oath attached

One more thing, and it is the one that will make this possible.

If something goes into that pot, no promise has been made to keep it.

That sounds obvious. It is not obvious to a man who has an empty pot on his sill, because the reason it has stayed empty for a year is precisely that filling it felt like a commitment, and the last commitment ended at the trash can.

So let me remove the commitment entirely. Put something in it. If that one goes too, the pot gets emptied again and nothing at all has been proved, and it may be filled again or not.

You are free to act with no vow attached to the acting, and a pot with something in it has never once been a signature on anything. The written word in Philippians 3 commits to one thing done and not to an outcome secured, and the Holy Spirit is the one who holds that distinction open.

There is no running total. Nobody is counting. There is no ledger anywhere in which this year appears as a loss.

You are free to act without swearing to anything, and filling a pot has never once been the same as making a promise about next year. Philippians 3:13 commits to one thing done rather than to an outcome secured, and the Holy Spirit is the one who lets a man begin without a vow attached.