The Carpenters Table

PREPARATION

I admit it, I suck at math. I rely on Excel and calculators to ensure accuracy, and I often check my work twice before doing anything. The Bearded One is good with numbers. He is the parent who checks the math homework and adds the dice when we play 10,000. I’m impressed with his ability to measure and accurately build things. Recently, he purchased plans from a master wood crafter (Ron Paulk) for a series of workbenches. The specifications for these benches were several pages long with multiple metric measurements. We went shopping over the weekend to purchase the items he needed to create the miter saw tool bench. I may be one of the only wives who enjoy date night at Home Depot, but that’s where we headed; list in hand, ready to start the build on Saturday. The Bearded One reviewed the plans multiple times, and he ordered the special tools required to build precision workbenches based on the plans laid out by the master carpenter he follows on YouTube.

PROCESS

Saturday morning, he headed down to the tool trailer and garage to begin the first steps of the process. Layout and plan to cut several pieces of wood to precise sizes to ensure the best use of material. After all, once you cut the wood, you’re committed. When I came downstairs from doing my least favorite thing on earth, laundry, I was eager to see where he was in the plans. He had all the vertical supports cut and was ready to start the next step: routing the supports with a new tool he never used. With a sizeable plunging router in hand, he made his first cuts. The first one could have been better. He could see the router wasn’t set correctly and caused the inside to be misshaped in the corner. He could do nothing; the imperfection was there but wouldn’t cause any integrity issues. It is a blemish that would remain well after the bench was built to completion. The rest of the day was spent cutting out all the precise holes so that he could assemble the table on Sunday.

The Precision Tools

He followed the plans – often referring back to them to ensure he fully understood what he needed and where to cut. The whole process was overwhelming for me. My brain doesn’t work like his does. I loved listening to him explain his plans and I’m sure I looked at him like a deer in the headlights. He respected my lack of understanding and inability to “math in my head.” Once the whole table was cut out – we called it a day. Everything was prepared and ready to build the Master Planners designed table.

SUNDAY

But First Coffee…

I love Sunday mornings. I spend my time in my Bible; we browse for homes and enjoy the quiet. Once we finished our morning coffee, we headed down to sand, route, and assemble the table. So much preparation goes into a plan. The templates are necessary to ensure everything is uniform and built the same. My job was to sand everything. He hates sanding; I love it and find it to be rewarding to sand the table to a satin finish. We both worked in harmony and just enjoyed some tunes. This table was designed to be a tool for a woodworker, and for it to work accurately, it had to be exact.

168 HOLES

The next job was to route the inside of 168- 20 mm holes on the table’s surface. Everything was coming together beautifully. We put the table together before glue and screw assembly to see if everything was working within the scope and plans.

MODIFICATION

The Bearded One was concerned with where the miter saw would sit. He was concerned that the routed area was too tall for his specific brand table. He decided to slightly modify the routed site so that it was a bit lower—a decision he would later regret.

ASSEMBLY AND TESTING

The table went together beautifully. To look at the table, sure, we saw the flaws in the template router miscalculation. The outside person would never notice it unless we pointed it out. Nevertheless, the uglies were there. We glued and assembled the table and decided to test it with his saw. Sliding the saw in place and moving it into place, we heard a crack. His modification was too close to the unsupported lower edge of the underside of the supports. The integrity was lost because it was without the spec of the design. It wasn’t in the blueprints.

PLAN B

The table is glued and screwed together. There is no taking it apart at this point, so we had to modify the plan to ensure the integrity of the saw holder would hold. Lowering that routed area to accommodate his saw changed the blueprints. This damage would now need to modify the structure, causing a ripple effect of other issues. He couldn’t store the saw horses inside the table if braced from below, which is how the Master Woodworker designed it. Thankfully, we came up with a structurally sound solution and can move forward with completing the table.

MASTER PLANNER

A master planner designs the story of our lives. Everything in our lives is known and set in a particular order for a specific reason. We live with free will and the ability to change the course of our lives. We change jobs; we change our hair color; we modify blueprints or weekend plans. None of these changes are a surprise to God.

God sets us apart and fully loves us, even with our flaws. The table has a defect, but the plan’s design wasn’t incorrect. The design was perfect. It was the modification to the blueprint that caused the break. Sure, it was fixable; however, some decisions we make in our lives leave a permanent scar.

BLUEPRINTS

So, how do you know what the design of your life is if you don’t know how to read blueprints? Thankfully, for people like me, God doesn’t talk to us in metric measurements. God speaks to us through his Word. His Word is the Bible. God created the universe out of nothing. Understanding that he is our Master Designer can ease the fear of the unknown future. “God is all-knowing (Omniscient) and all-powerful (Omnipotent). Past and present evil does not negate the fact that the all-powerful, infinite God will one day bring evil to an end.” Mark Driscol (Trinity Church).

We have to trust that the blueprints of our life from our Master designer are perfect because we are created in his image. Even when we’re in a season of hurting, God is working. Even when badly broken, we need support to return to him; God is working. He is always with us, even if it doesn’t seem like he’s there.

The Carpenters table is complete and will serve its purpose. It will help create beautiful furniture. That the Bearded One will design. The table with all of its flaws was designed perfectly by a master designer. I’m sure if Ron Paulk saw my husbands first attempt at creating one of his designs, he would be so happy to see the work he created. He wouldn’t look at it with judgemental eyes, he’d look at the table with love and admiration at what his design created. God looks at us that way as well. He loves us, even when we’re not as we should be. Profoundly, “Let the focus of your inner life rest on one truth, the staggering, mind-blowing truth that God loves you unconditionally as you are and not as you should be. Because nobody is as they should be.” – Brennan Manning