I Want A Sign That It Is Working

You are not asking for it to come up.

That is what makes this worth a whole article, because it is more specific than impatience and you have been quite precise about it in your own head.

You are asking for a sign that the process is under way. Something small. A crack in the surface. A slight lift in the soil. Anything at all that would tell you that down there, in the dark, the thing is happening.

You do not need the plant. You need to know it has started.

And you have noticed that this is what keeps you awake. Not the wanting. The not knowing whether anything at all is occurring, and the fact that there is no instrument in the world that would tell you without destroying the thing you would be measuring.

You are not owed a sign and you are not being refused one, and asking for evidence has never once put a man on the wrong side of anything.

Let me start by taking one thing off you, because I suspect it is there.

You have half a feeling that wanting evidence is a lower grade of faith. That a better man would be able to sit in the dark without asking. That the asking itself is the problem.

I do not think Scripture supports that, and I think the passage everybody uses to prove it says something rather different.

Blessed are they that have not seen

There is a line at the end of John's gospel that has been used to make people feel small, and it is worth reading with the story still attached.

Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed. (John 20:29, King James Version)

Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.

Now, before that sentence, look at what actually happened. Thomas asked for evidence. Specific evidence. He named exactly what he wanted to see and touch.

And Jesus came and offered it to him. Reach hither thy finger. He did not refuse. He did not lecture. He turned up and held out the thing that had been asked for.

You are asking a question that got answered rather than rebuked, and a request for evidence has never once been met in that room with a refusal. John 20 has Jesus arriving with the exact thing Thomas named, and the Holy Spirit is the one who keeps a famous verse from being read as a reprimand.

So what is the sentence doing?

It is not scolding Thomas. It is widening the room. Jesus is looking past him at everybody who would come afterward and would not get a body to touch, and He is saying: they are not second class. Blessed are they.

That is a promotion of the ones without evidence, not a demotion of the one who asked for it.

You are the person that sentence was spoken to protect, and a man standing in the dark without proof has never once been the lesser figure in that story. The Holy Spirit is the one who says blessed over exactly the position you are standing in, and the written word puts that blessing on the ones who never got the sign rather than on the ones who did.

And there is one more thing worth having. Thomas got his evidence and it settled the matter for about as long as evidence ever settles anything, which is to say it settled that one question and no future ones.

You were never going to be finished by one sign, and a piece of evidence has never once closed a question permanently for anybody. The Spirit of God is the one who gives a man something steadier than proof, and the word blesses the believing that runs on without it.

What a sign would actually buy

Let me be practical about the thing being asked for, because I think it is worth pricing.

Suppose you got it. Suppose you went out tomorrow and there was a hairline crack in the surface.

What happens? You would be enormously relieved for somewhere between four hours and a day. And then a new question would form, because that is what minds do: it has cracked, but is it healthy, is it late, is it going to make it.

The sign does not end the wondering. It relocates it.

You are asking for a thing that would move the question rather than close it, and one piece of evidence has never once been able to end an appetite that renews itself. The Holy Spirit is the one who settles what evidence keeps failing to settle, and John 20:29 calls the ones with no sign at all blessed rather than merely tolerated.

And there is a second thing about the asking that I want to say gently.

The asking is not the problem. The asking is fine. Thomas asked and was not reproved and neither are you.

What is costing you is that the asking has become continuous. It is not a request any more, it is a posture, and a man cannot rest in a posture of continuous request.

You are able to ask a thing once and stop holding the question open, and a request made and left has never once been a request abandoned. The Spirit of God is the one who takes a thing that has been asked and holds it, and the written word shows a man asking plainly once rather than continuously.

Put your hand on it

So here is the assignment, and it is deliberately the opposite of an inspection.

Put your hand flat on the soil for a moment, and take it away without digging.

Just the palm, flat, on the surface. Feel the temperature of it and whether it is damp. Then lift your hand and stand up.

You are able to make contact with a thing without interrogating it, and a hand laid on the surface has never once needed to become a hand going into the ground. John 20 has a man invited to reach out and touch, and the Holy Spirit is the one out on that step while your palm is flat on the soil.

Here is why this and not something else.

What the reaching has been for is contact. Not really information. The wanting is to know that it is real and that something is going on and that this is not a man standing in a yard talking to himself, and a hand on the soil gives the real part without giving a verdict.

It is the closest thing to the evidence you wanted that costs nothing and destroys nothing.

You are permitted to want contact and to have it, and touching something has never once been the same thing as demanding it explain itself. The Holy Spirit is the one present in a hand held against the ground, and the word calls the ones without proof blessed, which leaves a man free to touch the dirt for no reason at all.

And while your hand is there, ask once. Out loud if you like. Then take your hand away and let the asking be finished for today.