Where One little thing might lead.....

"Now what?"
There I stood with the couch upended precariously. It weighed at least 5 times more than me and I still had 30 feet to inch it forward.... and fit it through a door. But my muscles were doing crazy mushy limp giving up kind of wiggles.
"Can I get a little more help here?" I panted to Asherel, who had been drafted into couch moving duty. At first she had thought this was a good exchange for not doing math, but now she was anxious to return to math.

It had started with moving just one little white lamp. And then a few pictures.... and then a broken end table, and then a book shelf and than a rocking chair, and then a small couch, and now here I stood with a queen size sleeper sofa upended and my muscles had quit on me. It was a nuclear arms race of home decorating. To all of you thinking of moving "just that little lamp over there", I warn you, consider the cost carefully first.

"Measure the door," I wheezed weakly.
"Shouldn't we have done that before we moved it? " she asked.
"Don't live life backwards. Move forward! Now measure, please."
"33 inches."
"How wide is the door? Will it fit? "
"30 inches."
"Couches squish. Can we shove it through?"
"I don't know Mom, you measure."
Hmmm. Not likely. The width of the couch was solid wood frame. No squish room at all. We would have to upend and walk it in, pivoting it around the corner.
"Why are we doing this?" asked Asherel.
I chose not to answer, mostly because I was gasping for oxygen to fuel my muscles that were increasingly wobbly.
"Hold the couch, please," I said, though in all honesty, I am not sure I said "please". For this I will toss and turn on my bed when Asherel goes off to college.
While Asherel obediently waited with the behemoth couch, I ran and got the furniture dolly. Arvo got me one the last time I moved "just one little lamp."

We managed to get the dolly under the couch, wrestled it through the door and then slid it through a just wide enough passage beside the pool table.

"Where will it go?" asked Asherel.
"Along that wall," I answered, leaning my blue face against the cushions.
"Will it fit?"
"We will make it fit. That may entail moving that one little wall over there....."
We huffed and we puffed and the couch slid finally into its new home. It fit perfectly. We collapsed on the couch and gazed happily at our work.
At least I gazed happily. Asherel again asked, "Why did we do this?"
"Go do your math," I groaned.

Ironically, at her gavel club meeting the next hour, one student did a speech on ripping her arm half way out of her shoulder joint by moving a heavy object. I was listening, though my eyes were closed and my head was on the table, and my aching arms were stretched out in a facsimile of sleep. The student closed the speech saying, "I never thought that something so simple as moving something heavy could result in so much pain and such a bad injury." I peeked through one eye at the gruesome pictures she was showing of the actual operation to stitch her bone back into her shoulder joint.

I have heard a few messages about "counting the cost" lately. God is naturally in on this discussion as well.
He gives us plenty of incentives to follow Him, but He also doesn't want us to take faith lightly. Once we take the leap, we are admonished not to turn back. Being a true disciple in any endeavor involves commitment and passion to see it through to the end. Half hearted devotion to God is as crazy as moving a 500 pound couch, standing it on its end, and thinking, "That's enough."

Proverbs 20:25 (New International Version)

 ²⁵ It is a trap to dedicate something rashly
   and only later to consider one’s vows.

Luke 14:30-32 (New International Version)

 ²⁸ “Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it? ²⁹ For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you, ³⁰ saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able to finish.
   ³¹ “Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? ³² If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace