If you’re in a season that seems “wasteful” because of the current pandemic, or because of where you live, or chronic illness, or crying babies, or elderly parents who need your help, or whatever other reason you can’t “get it all done,” then perhaps this is the training ground that God has readied for you.

Not too long ago, I followed some incredibly resourceful, timesaving ways of managing our home. The system was supremely efficient.

My grocery list was organized by aisle, so I didn’t redundantly traverse the same path twice. My laundry was tackled like one of those washing-machine commercials where the clothes fold themselves into neat towers. My family’s meals were homecooked with the groceries that I’d so competently purchased. And all those things were checked off my to-do between shuttling our kids to and from school, multiple playdates, Taekwondo and ballet lessons, and our family’s church commitments.

But my predictably organized world came to an abrupt halt when we moved to India, after ten years of living in a suburb of Portland.

Entrenched Inefficiency

Rather quickly, I found out that precious little worked according to plan. Appointments were missed because of ugly traffic. Produce on my carefully crafted menu plan would be out of stock (without apology). My washing machine would cheerily take breaks, thanks to intermittent power cuts every single day. I couldn’t jump in my minivan and shuttle the kids to lessons, because navigating the roads was like dodging obstacles in a seriously intense video game.

The structure that I’d come to rely on started to unravel in a world where anything that could go wrong, would go wrong. But the newfound disorder in my life gave me a practical lesson in a simple truth: I am not in control.

Today, as millions across the world are locked down and shut in because of the coronavirus, as swaths of people face job losses and missed work opportunities, and as our calendars present a series of canceled events, we have little choice but to acknowledge our entrenched inefficiency.

Too Efficient to Depend on God

The Western world ordinarily runs on heightened productivity. Set patterns are followed. Our schedules are filled with appointments and priorities. Stores and restaurants are open at their normal hours. Meetings are not broken up by low Internet bandwidth.

Of course, we’re grateful — and should be — for a system that thrives, but when our hands are tied because of a global pandemic, it’s a relevant time to ask ourselves, Am I normally so entrenched in efficiency that I don’t desperately need God? Has our yearning for God been replaced by a temporary satisfaction fueled by how much we can accomplish in the shortest span of time? Has our drive to be efficient chipped away at our dependence on God?

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