SPILLED INK

The room was filled with books, stacks of yellowed papers, and magazines with curling faded covers. In the center of it all sat Dr. Gregory Stephens behind a mid-century desk that was undeniably plucked from the 1970’s. 

I was the only student who signed up for his class (nerd alert) on I and II Kings. But, rather than cancel the course, he offered to meet with me once a week. In that brief time he gave more insight into those stories than you could ever dream of learning for yourself in a library full of books. It was the definition of content overload. But some of the things he taught me stuck more than others. In all my time spent in an office that had been frozen in the 70’s what stuck was a tradition of the ancient Kings of Israel. 

The first five books of the Bible form the backbone of the Jewish tradition, faith, and culture. Before a King could ascend the throne he was meant to produce his copy of the Pentateuch. Let’s break this down. Before becoming King you had to copy by hand the first five books of the Bible. That's approximately 1/5 of the modern Christian Bible … over 124,000 words… and all that had to be done by hand. But wait… there’s more. Because in the ancient world, you couldn’t just produce your copy Willy Nilly and put it out there. This wasn’t the internet. People had standards. You couldn’t make mistakes. No typos. No errors. After all, this was the word of God you were copying. If you made a mistake you scrapped it all and started over. The purity and perfection of the sacred text were not something to be trifled with. 

Disclaimer: Based on what we know of Israel’s history it is safe to say very few, if any of the kings, completed this requirement. But, the idea stuck and I did what I do best: launched into a project mode so truly obsessive it makes Joe Goldberg look tame.

I hopped in my car, put on the soundtrack from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe (the occasion merited some epic music) went to Barnes and Noble after that class, and bought a large leather-bound journal, emblazoned with a lion. That night I got to work making my copy of the Pentateuch. 

Just to clarify, I wasn’t expecting to ascend a throne. But the heart behind the old tradition was something I found beautiful. Noble. Good.

The practice was designed to drive valuable truths deep down into the heart. To prepare the individual for the road ahead. And that is something I can get behind. 

I spent months working on it. After homework was done, papers written, and RA duties complete, I’d sit down, dip the pen in the black inkwell, and copy a chapter into the journal before heading to bed. I was making some progress too. Pages and pages of black cursive script (barely legible) with golden flourishes filled the journal until one night I bumped the bottle and before I could set my clumsiness right The ink spilled and spread over the middle of the page, seeping into the pages below. A stygian blight on a project with clear standards concerning such blights and errors. 

That was the last night I copied a chapter. Project Become King: Cancelled. 

I still have that book. The journal with the lion on the front. And it still has the black blot of ink in the center of the last page I ever copied in it. I never finished. The ink spilled. Truth be told, I should have thrown it out. Because that’s what you’re supposed to do. When the ink spills, when the error is made, the story is cooked. Finished. We want crisp and clear black lines, with golden embellishments that sing, not blobs of Stygian bile erupting onto the pages and infecting all of the pages that come after it.

Now, those kinds of standards may be necessary to be a Scribe producing flawless copies of ancient texts for all of posterity, but they have no place in the real world. Because when faith meets reality, it’s rarely comprised of crisp and clean lines.

“HOLY PLACES ARE DARK PLACES.

IT IS LIFE AND STRENGTH,

NOT KNOWLEDGE AND WORDS,

THAT WE GET IN THEM.

HOLY WISDOM IS NOT CLEAR

AND THIN LIKE WATER,

BUT THICK AND DARK LIKE BLOOD.”

— C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces

But we still recoil at the ink we spill. Not in our handwritten copies of the Bible (Bible nerd flex), but in our stories. In “their” stories (whoever “their” is in your world). We like stories to be tidy and neat, struggles to be sorted, heroes to be stalwarts, and leaders one-dimensional.

But when you open up the book, assess the stories, take an honest look at your own, you’ll see a tapestry of pages covered with the stain of spilled ink. Decisions made, mistakes committed, paths that you took which no one else could understand or comprehend. 

Those blots aren’t the end of the story. The end of your life. The end of you. 

We only get one, and a little spilled ink, no matter the color or amount, doesn’t get to redefine who you are, determine your worth, or censure your voice.

Because that spilled ink, whatever your reason was for spilling it, for killing the smoke machine and giving the world more than pretty overdressed words, can be so much more. Turn the light on, reopen the book, and look at the spilled ink again. 

Maybe that “mistake” is something more. Maybe that ink stain is an opportunity for something unexpected. Something beautiful.