Taking Inventory

Four times a year I take inventory at work because I’m the inventory maven. Do you want to know about a print item—what we’ve got, where it is? I’m your source. There is a problem, however; if you want to know exactly how much we have of anything, I can get you close but not exact. That’s the best I can do.

Two minutes after I take a count on an item, someone may pull ten off the shelf, and the inventory is no longer accurate. I know that; we know that. A new system is on the horizon, but for now we live with close, not to the piece.

As I counted a couple of weeks ago, I mentally bemoaned the unavoidable inaccuracy as I watched a coworker walk away with a stack of materials to pack and ship for an order. What I was doing seemed futile. It’s wasn’t. The numbers are close enough for our basic purposes. Once the new system is implemented, we’ll have much more data. So useless it’s not, even though currently it’s frustrating.

As I stood on a stepladder to reach a shelf, I realized my life was like inventory. Every time I take stock of my life, things are off. Not totally. It may be in line in this area, but completely off in that. I want everything to line up correctly all the time. I have this illusion of Heaven while I’m on earth (residual perfectionistic tendencies). When I think about it, of course, it’s absurd. I can’t get there while here.

Recently I’ve grabbed on to a phrase coined by Lysa TerKeurst in Unglued (published by Zondervan). More than grabbed, I’m hanging on ferociously. It’s simply:

an imperfect progress

I like it. If fact, ever since I reading those three words, they’ve rolled over my tongue like a sumptuous piece of dark chocolate. An imperfect progress is what our friend the Apostle Paul talks about in many ways—pressing on, in spite of what is behind and in us. Another friend, the Apostle John, says we are liars unless we acknowledge that we still sin, and that being the case, our progress in our Christian lives can’t be anything but imperfect. The very thought that we must progress at all means we haven’t gotten it all perfect yet anyway.

My week was full of imperfect progress. There were thoughts to lasso and tie down. Some emotions needed to be reined in while others needed to be watered and fed.

Perhaps if I were honest, I’d say that there were times this week that my heavenly father looked upon me and smiled, but that almost scorches my fingers to type. Because I know I’m imperfect, it’s so difficult for me to even think that God smiles down on me. (This is an area that needs much work.) I’m sure there were other occasions when my father looked down, without surprise, of course (because God is never astonished), and knew that a certain thought or behavior necessitated still more training. You see, it’s been an imperfect progress. Yes, it has.

Inventory at work isn’t a useless activity, nor is taking stock of my life as long as I understand the limitations of the present inventory system at work and embrace the tension between imperfect and progress.  An imperfect progress. A humble moving forward. A recognition (not a resignation) that progress includes failure. And progress, directed by the perfect Shepherd, will bring me—us—to our perfect home and perfection in him.