There is something deeply satisfying about finishing something.
A completed project.
A clean kitchen.
A lawn entirely raked.
An inbox containing no unread messages.
I include that last example principally for its imaginative value.
Completion gives us a lovely sense that, for one shining moment, the universe has been brought under control. The dishes are put away. The laundry is folded. The sermon is written. The committee minutes have been approved. The batteries in the smoke detector have finally been replaced.
We stand back and admire our achievement.
Then someone walks into the kitchen carrying a dirty mug.
And creation falls once again into chaos.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons Ordinary Time matters.
The great festivals of the Church have a certain completeness about them. Christmas arrives with angels and shepherds and a child in a manger. Easter arrives with lilies, trumpets, and the astonishing announcement that Christ is risen. Pentecost brings wind and fire. Thanksgiving gathers us around tables groaning beneath the weight of turkey, potatoes, pie, and enough leftovers to feed a modest monastery.
Then comes Tuesday.
Nothing particularly dramatic happens.
There are emails to answer.
Appointments to keep.
Groceries to buy.
Someone has misplaced the car keys.
Again.
And most of life is rather like that.
We Live in the Middle
We like beginnings and endings.
Beginnings are full of possibility. Endings give us satisfaction.
But most of life is lived somewhere between them.
We are becoming something we have not yet become.
We are learning things we have not yet mastered.
We are carrying questions that have not yet been answered.
We are praying prayers whose answers we cannot yet see.
We are trying to forgive.
Trying to trust.
Trying to understand.
Trying to become the people God created us to be.
And we are not finished.
This can be frustrating.
We sometimes imagine that the Christian life ought to produce quicker results.
Surely, after all these years of prayer, worship, Scripture, sermons, Eucharists, committees, potluck suppers, and patiently singing hymns selected by other people, we ought to have become saints by now.
And yet there we are, driving home from church irritated because someone took too long to pull out of the parking lot.
Sanctification, apparently, is taking longer than anticipated.
Jesus Seems Remarkably Comfortable With Process
One of the striking things about Jesus is how often he speaks about the Kingdom of God using images of things that are growing.
Seeds.
Fields.
Vines.
Trees.
Yeast working quietly through dough.
None of these things happens instantly.
You cannot plant a tomato seed at breakfast and complain at lunch that nothing useful has happened.
Well, you can.
But the tomato will remain unimpressed.
Growth takes time.
Roots form where no one can see them.
Seeds break open underground.
Yeast works invisibly.
Branches stretch slowly toward the light.
Much of God’s work in us happens in exactly this way.
Quietly.
Slowly.
Often invisibly.
There are seasons when we wonder whether anything is happening at all.
But grace is patient.
God seems considerably less anxious about our progress than we are.
The Holiness of Half-Finished Things
Perhaps we need to recover a theology of the unfinished.
The prayer that still feels awkward.
The relationship that is slowly healing.
The grief that has become lighter but has not disappeared.
The habit we are trying to change.
The faith that still contains questions.
The ministry whose future we cannot yet see.
The person we are still becoming.
We often look at these things and see failure because they are incomplete.
God may look at them and see growth.
There is a difference.
A house under construction is not a failed house.
A garden in April is not a failed garden.
A child learning to walk is not a failed pedestrian.
And a Christian still learning to love is not a failed disciple.
We are simply unfinished.
And unfinished is not the same thing as abandoned.
God Has Not Put Down the Tools
There is a lovely confidence in Paul’s words to the Philippians: the God who began a good work among them will bring it to completion.
Notice where the confidence lies.
Not in their determination.
Not in their spiritual discipline.
Not in their impressive religious accomplishments.
The confidence lies in God.
God began the work.
God continues the work.
God will complete the work.
That does not make us passive. We still pray, serve, repent, forgive, learn, risk, love, and begin again.
But we do these things knowing that the deepest work of transformation belongs to grace.
God is not standing over us with a clipboard saying, “Honestly, I expected considerably more progress by October.”
God is the patient gardener.
The careful carpenter.
The artist who sees something in the unfinished canvas that the rest of us cannot yet imagine.
Ordinary Time Is Workshop Time
Maybe that is one way to think about these days between Thanksgiving and All Saints.
This is workshop time.
There are wood shavings on the floor.
Paint on the brushes.
Half-finished things everywhere.
The Church has taken off some of its festival clothing and returned to the ordinary work of becoming.
And perhaps that is exactly where we need to be.
Because All Saints is coming.
Soon we will remember those remarkable women and men whose lives revealed something of the holiness of God.
But I suspect that if we could ask most of the saints whether they considered themselves finished products, they would laugh.
Probably rather loudly.
The saints were not people who reached spiritual perfection and spent the remainder of their lives glowing gently in stained-glass windows.
They struggled.
They doubted.
They failed.
They repented.
They started again.
They discovered that holiness is less about arriving and more about continuing to walk toward God.
That is good news for the rest of us.
Perhaps Today Is Enough
You do not need to finish your whole life today.
You do not need to solve every problem.
You do not need to understand every mystery.
You do not need to become completely patient, perfectly generous, entirely forgiving, universally cheerful, and capable of attending every church meeting without occasionally wondering how long it will last.
Today you may simply need to take the next faithful step.
Say the prayer.
Make the phone call.
Offer the apology.
Take the walk.
Read the Scripture.
Feed someone.
Forgive a little more than yesterday.
Notice the person who needs kindness.
Begin again.
Because God is not waiting for the finished version of you before deciding to love you.
God is already here.
Among the loose ends.
Among the unanswered questions.
Among the half-finished projects and prayers.
Among the ordinary Tuesdays when nothing seems particularly holy.
The workshop lights are still on.
The tools are still on the bench.
And grace is still at work.
Perhaps the great spiritual discovery of Ordinary Time is simply this:
God is not only waiting for us at the finish line.
God is with us in the unfinished things.
And that means there may be considerably more holiness lying around your ordinary life today than you imagined.
Even beside the dirty mug someone just left in the kitchen.
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Companion Prayer
Loving God, meet me in the unfinished places—in the questions, the slow progress, and the things still undone. Give me patience with myself, courage for the next faithful step, and trust that your grace is still at work in me. Amen.