When Productivity Becomes An Idol

I recently read most of Elyse Fitzpatricks’s “Idols of the Heart” and chapters 4 & 5 of Paul Tripp’s “Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands.” Both books spend time talking about the heart and our idolatry issue. The root of all of our sin is this: we were created to worship, but we so often place something other than God on the throne of our hearts. Our hearts desire things, and those things (or the desires) are not always inherently evil. Rather, they become sinful when we allow those desires to grow, control us, and become what we worship instead of God.

So, recently, as I’ve been dealing with pregnancy “morning sickness” (which, by the way, is not confined to the morning hours), I think I’ve found in my heart a new idol: that of productivity.

Ouch.

I’ve written before on here about being a “Type A,” driven, get-things-done kind of person. I make a to-do list almost every morning and set about starting to tick things off the list. It feels good to make progress and be productive.

But then pregnancy symptoms sideline my day. It happens most days recently: I have a list of things I want to do, and I get out of bed ready to get those things done…and then I have to return to bed because I’m nauseous, vomiting, or so exhausted I can barely drag myself across the apartment. As I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, I mourn the fact that my productivity for the day is zero.

 Well, when I read Tripp’s chapters a couple of weeks ago, the wheels started turning in my head. Why does the morning sickness totally wreck my mood? Aside from, of course, the fact that I actually feel like trash, the reason it wrecks me is that it has taken away something that has become very important to me: my productivity.

I don’t measure up to my standards of productive and successful when I can barely get out of bed to fill my water bottle (thank the Lord for my husband who so graciously fills it for me so I don’t have to move). And that hurts me a little inside…a lot more than I would like to admit.

I’ve taken my desire to get things done and I have, once again, placed my hope, my identity, and my measure of success in that desire. I have, once again, pushed God aside as my hope and identity and stuck something else in his place. I have, once again, forgotten that I am a child of God and that no amount of “doing” will make me better or worse in his sight.

In an effort to address my idolatrous heart, I’ve started each morning the last few days with a new prayer. I’ll take my to-do list and I’ll say, “Heavenly Father, here are the things that I want to get done. But I know that your plan may look different than mine today. I acknowledge that you are sovereign and you are good. I trust you. Help me to hold these desires loosely, and to keep you on the throne of my heart today, no matter what happens.”                

It doesn’t change my productivity, but maybe it will change my heart in those unproductive moments. God has something he wants to teach me, some way he wants to grow and change me…even if it means he has to have me on my back for hours to do that. I’m looking forward to when the morning sickness passes and I can get our home back in order, but for now…maybe I can learn to trust him and rest in his sovereign plan even in the midst of long, unproductive days