She Finally Got To
The word for Thursday, August 27, 2026 is She Finally Got To.
The anchor verses are Colossians 2:14 and Ephesians 1:7.
On Tuesday a nine year old girl named Ivy Lou Nibarger walked into the Bath Food Bank in Maine and handed over five hundred dollars.
She had raised five hundred twenty five dollars in four hours selling lemonade.
The director of that food bank says the money will cover about two weeks of kid-friendly food.
The reason she gave matters more than the number.
She said she has seen people at Walmart who do not have much money, and that she has always wanted to buy things for them, and she never got to. So she wanted to do a lemonade stand for people like that.
I have always wanted to buy things for them, and I never got to.
That is a sentence spoken by somebody who is nine.
Always, for her, is her entire life. She has been carrying that intention for as long as she can remember carrying anything. She noticed something in a store, more than once, and it stayed with her, and she wanted to do something about it.
And she had no way.
A nine year old has no money. She cannot write a check. She cannot pick up somebody's groceries at the register, because she has nothing to pick them up with. Whatever she felt standing in that store, she had no instrument for it.
So the wanting sat there. For years.
Then her family helped her set up a table with lemonade and popsicles. Four hours later she had five hundred twenty five dollars, and she took it to the food bank.
That money was not settling anything she owed.
She does not know the families it will feed. They may never know who she is. She will not stand beside those shelves and decide who gets what. She gave the money and walked away. The help will reach somebody she never met because her wanting finally found an instrument.
Paul uses the language of an account in his letter to the Colossians.
He is warning them against teachings that would make belonging to CHRIST depend on rules, observances, or spiritual credentials.
In the middle of that warning comes one of the strongest sentences in the letter.
Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.
The Greek word behind handwriting can mean a handwritten certificate of debt. A written record of obligation.
Paul says GOD blotted it out. Took it out of the way. Nailed it to the cross.
Nobody in that transaction was paying their own bill.
The image is cancellation. GOD does not lower the figure or arrange a schedule. The record that stood against us is taken away through the cross.
Guilt trains people to think in installments. Improve this. Make up for that. Prove the change is real. Paul's verbs move the other direction. Blotted out. Taken away. Nailed to the cross. GOD is the One doing the verbs.
And the cross was public. Rome meant it to be. The place meant to display shame became the place Paul points to when he says the record no longer stands.
Then Ephesians names what that cancellation cost.
In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace.
According to the riches of HIS grace.
Not according to what you brought. Not according to what your situation could support. According to what HE has, which is the only reason any of it works.
Grace leaves no minimum payment for you to make. GOD acts from HIS abundance where you had no instrument adequate to the account.
There is no arrangement in which GOD is waiting on your contribution. There never was. HE has never once been short of anything, and the whole account was settled out of HIS own resources while most of the people it covered were nowhere near the cross.
There is something you have wanted to do for a long time.
Maybe you have watched somebody struggle and had no way to help. Maybe you have carried an intention for years with no instrument for it, and it has started to feel like a private failure rather than a real love.
The lack of an instrument does not make the love false. Ivy wanted to help before she had anything to give. Then there was a table, a pitcher, four hours, and people willing to stop.
Ivy was nine. She finally got to.
The need she met was not hers to owe. She gave according to what she had.
What CHRIST gave was according to the riches of HIS grace. HE settled what we could not settle, and Paul says the record is canceled, taken away, and nailed to the cross.
I am not here to prove myself. I am here to make HIM visible.
- 🙏 To the one carrying a love you have no way to spend.
- 🙏 To the one who has been counting a debt that was cancelled a long time ago.
- 🙏 To the one who thinks your part is too small to bother with.
- 🙏 To the one who was helped by a stranger and never got to say thank you.
Grace and Peace.