Somebody Gave Me A Box Of Food

Somebody put a box on your counter.

They were kind about it. They said something light so it would not be a moment, and they left quickly so you would not have to respond, and both of those were the right call and you were grateful in a complicated way.

And the box is still there.

You have been through it, once, standing up, the evening it arrived. There are things in it you recognize and things in it you do not. There is an item that has clearly come out of somebody else's cupboard. There are two things you would never have bought and one thing you are not certain how to open.

And you have eaten almost none of it.

Not out of pride, exactly. It is more that the box is not a meal, it is a collection of things somebody else chose, and standing in front of it you have no idea where to start, and the not knowing is heavier than the hunger.

So let me say the first thing plainly, before anything practical.

Nothing in this article is going to make that box mean something about you.

It is food that somebody put on a counter. It is not a verdict, it is not a season, it is not a lesson being taught. And nothing here is going to suggest you buy a single item to go with it, because the whole of tonight happens out of that box.

Tell me, what hast thou in the house

There is a moment in Second Kings where a woman with nothing is asked a question, and the question is about her own house.

And Elisha said unto her, What shall I do for thee? tell me, what hast thou in the house? And she said, Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil. (2 Kings 4:2, King James Version)

Tell me, what hast thou in the house.

He does not send out for anything. He does not arrange a collection, and he does not start with a plan. The first move is a question about the inventory, and the inventory is wherever she is standing.

And her answer is honest and small. Not any thing, save a pot of oil. She does not pretend there is more, and nobody asks her to.

You are being asked what is in that house rather than what you know how to do with it, and a box of things somebody else chose has never once been nothing. Second Kings 4:2 begins with a question about what is already there, and the Holy Spirit is the one present with a woman who has walked past a box for three days.

And read the word save.

Not any thing, save a pot of oil. Save is the word that takes something out of the nothing, and the whole of what follows in that chapter runs on the thing that got excepted.

There is a save in that box. It is the item you would actually know what to do with if the rest of the box were not sitting next to it, confusing the question.

You have a save in that box rather than a pile you cannot read, and one item you recognize has never once been canceled by the ones you do not. The Spirit of God is the one with somebody standing in front of a counter and not starting, and Second Kings 4:2 gets everything out of the one thing that survived the word nothing.

The box is not one object

Here is the practical half, and it is one correction. The box has been treated as a single thing that has to be understood all at once, and it is not one thing. It is nine or ten separate things that happen to share a container.

That matters because a single thing has to be solved, and a box of separate items only has to be sorted. The paralysis in that kitchen is a sorting job being mistaken for a problem.

So do the sorting, and it takes about four minutes. Take everything out and put it into three groups on the counter: things you know, things you half know, and things you are not sure about. Then put the third group back in the box and leave it there for now, because that group is the entire reason nothing has happened.

You were solving a box rather than sorting one, and a container of unrelated items has never once had to be understood all at once. Second Kings 4:2 asks a narrow question and gets one usable answer, and the Holy Spirit is the one with somebody putting things in rows on a counter.

And here is the second half, which is about the complicated gratitude, because that is genuinely part of why the box is still full. Taking from it feels like admitting something, and every time you reach in, the reaching in says out loud that this was needed. So the box stays full, and the not eating starts to feel like a small way of not having needed it.

Nobody who fills a box wants it kept. A full box is the one outcome the person who carried it in would find painful, and eating from it is the thing that completes what they were doing.

You are finishing something somebody started rather than admitting something, and food eaten from a box has never once been the same thing as a confession. The Spirit of God is the one in that kitchen with a hand reaching into a box, and Second Kings 4:2 has a woman say plainly what she has without being shamed for the size of it.

What tonight is, out of that box

So here is the assignment. Cook one thing tonight out of that box, and eat it sitting down.

Tonight. One thing. Sort it first, four minutes, three groups. Then take one item from the group you know and put it in the pan with whatever else is already in that kitchen. Do not go out and get anything to go with it, and leave the uncertain group exactly where it is.

It may not be good. That is expected, and it is information about a first attempt rather than about the box or about you.

You are cooking from the group you already know rather than from the one that frightened you, and the item you recognize has never once needed the rest of the box to be a meal. Second Kings 4:2 works entirely with the one thing the woman could name, and the Holy Spirit is the one at that stove with somebody who finally sorted a counter.

Then the second half, which is the one that does the work. Eat it sitting down, at a table, on a plate, not standing at the counter next to the box. The counter is where this has been happening for three days, and the whole difference tonight is a chair and a plate and ten minutes with the box behind you rather than in front of you.

You are sitting down with your back to that counter, and a meal eaten at a table has never once been the same event as standing in front of a box. The Spirit of God is the one at that table with a plate on it, and Second Kings 4:2 turns on what is already in the house.