Waiting for the Concrete to Dry

Blogging through Galatians was a bit of a bust. It was a promising start, but I faded somewhere around the middle of the second week. I can admit it - I'm a lousy blogger. Great intentions, not so much on the follow through. But, since it's all about Jesus, grace abounds (I hope). 

And so…hello Philippians!

"I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ." Philippians 1:6

Discipleship, sometimes...

For three summers in college, I worked for the NCDOT Bridge Maintenance Division in Rowan County. For a college student, it was a good job that paid pretty well. One of the jobs we did on a fairly regular basis was patching holes on bridges, which was especially fun on Interstate 85. We'd get to the site in the morning and after no small amount of deliberation, we'd patch the hole (which took around 2 hours, if memory serves). We'd break for lunch and then…wait for 2 hours. We were responsible for closing one lane of a very busy Interstate and if you drove by our crew around 1:30 in the afternoon, you'd see us standing around waiting for the new concrete to dry.

I was especially entertained by those motorists who felt it necessary to make comment about our activity level. I remember one man in particular, leaning out of his car window with a scowl, angrily yelling: "Get to work!" Many just looked our direction and shook their heads in frustration, surely thinking about their tax dollars going to waste.

Now imagine if we had opened that lane with the patch and a motorist had found themselves hitting a sizable hole filled with wet concrete going 80 mph. So, yeah, we stood around for a couple of hours while the concrete dried. Half of our crew left to go work somewhere else and those of us who stayed behind could only clean debris off the bridge so many times. And those who were uninformed about our work yelled and fumed, not realizing that waiting was a necessary part of completing the work.

Being a Christian is a journey that takes time. It actually takes a lifetime. And some of the work that God does in/through/on us is evident: repairing potholes in our lives, removing debris, pouring a new Spirit into us. 

Then there's the work that nobody can see and that most people don't understand. Our fellow Christians might even pass by us and want to yell: "Get to work!" But if God is working on you, trying to teach you something and you start moving before you're ready due to the expectations and demands of other people who don't understand what you and God are working on, there could be a lot of trouble. 

So much that God does in and with us is not seen or understood by other people. It can be quiet, slow work. Waiting for concrete to dry work. Cleaning off debris from our bridges, again and again. And at times, it's like taking a jackhammer to the damaged places - it feels like just more brokenness in the moment, but God doesn't leave us with an empty hole. Those broken places are cleaned and filled, stronger than before.

Just remember that there's some patience required, some standing around leaning on your shovel.

Don't lose heart.

Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength… (Isaiah 40:31a)