Gracious Inefficiency.

Efficiency is the currency of the West. Time is money after all.  There are books, articles, podcasts, and blogs about how to do things faster, work smarter, reduce wasted time, and achieve our goals and dreams in x number of simplified steps.  But what if that wasn’t the way of the Kingdom of God? The idol of our culture is to move from point A to point Z as quick as humanly possible (and bonus points if you can make it look like you didn’t break as sweat in the process), because our eye is on the end result. But what if it wasn’t about the goal as much as it was about the process? Are we living our lives for the weekend? For the raise? For the degree? For when the potty-training is over? For the next, the bigger, the better, the new?

A couple weeks ago my husband and I spent a couple nights away in the Windy City of Chicago and we decided to capitalize on the gift of a rare still and sunny day in early October and take the river and lake architectural boat tour. What I didn’t know before that tour was that the Chicago River actually sits about 5- 7 feet lower than Lake Michigan. In order to make the transition from the river to the lake you have to go through the Chicago Harbor Lock. As we headed for the “locking process,” I ran to the front of the boat to watch it unfold. Being that our tour was a total of 1.5 hours, I was surprised at how long it took to get all the boats into the lock and secured along the cement walls with the doors behind us tightly shut, so that they could finally open the front doors allowing the water from the lake to flow in. Once our tour guide let us know that the process would begin, I expected the doors in front of us to fling open. But they didn’t. They only allowed a small gap in the doors and what seemed to be a trickle of water in. My first thought was, “Are you kidding me? This is going to take forever!” Though it only took about 12-15 minutes to raise up our boat to meet the water level of the lake, it felt like an eternity in comparison to the time we had for the tour.

 As I stood at the bow of the ship watching the water come towards the boat, it occurred to me that it was grace that the process was slow and seemingly inefficient. If the lock operator flung the doors open, we would be consumed by the waters…overwhelmed…drowned. Slowly changing our water level gave our boat time to adjust and rise slowly so that it could bear the transition to higher “ground.”

These past few years have been a locking process for me and, you guys, I have wanted to charge the doors and have pleaded with the Lord to open the doors and let me out. But it was his grace that he allowed the waters to rise slowly because otherwise I would have drowned. In an instant-gratification society, we are going to have to learn to trust the one who holds our process. He is always preparing us for the next good works he has planned for us, but often times the process is graciously inefficient.

“…being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” Phil. 1:6 (NIV)

To Ponder:

 Name some ways our culture’s value of efficiency is infiltrating your walk with the Lord?

In what ways have you seen the Lord’s goodness to you in his inefficiency?

What stage of the “locking-process” are you currently in? Are you heading for the lock (preparing for transition), in the Lock (in transition), preparing to leave the lock (discerning where to go now that you’ve been through a transition), out in open waters (in the season you were prepared for)? How does naming that inform your actions right now?

To Pray:

Thank you, Lord, that you are not only the author of our story, but you hold every detail of the process you have us in as we become more and more the people you have created us to be. Lord, help us to trust the process you have us in. Help us to stay the course even though the days seem hard and the season long. Lord, thank you that you work out your plans for us in perfect timing. Thank you for your thoughtful, careful, personal knowing of us and how much water we can take in at a time. Thank you that you don’t overwhelm us, but that you graciously sustain us as the waters rise. Help us be people of process, not simply people of productivity. For your glory and our good, Amen.