lessons from an elevator

Today, I got in the elevator on the 33^rd floor of the Westin building. It paused for a moment, doors open. Then, suddenly, the doors started shaking in a pulse, as if they were trying to close but someone on the inside of the elevator shaft was fighting to keep them open. The whole car shook a bit, and I quickly hopped back to the lobby.

“I don’t think I trust that elevator,” I said to a passing friend.

“Oh, it always does that,” he said, “it’s fine.”

“Still, I think I’ll wait for another,” I stood until a moment later, a working elevator arrived quickly sunk me back to sea level.

I’ve realized, as one growing in the hope of Christianity, that this is what we so often do with Christ. We take something routine, like the day-to-day, and pretend to put our trust in it (the elevator will of course take us safely to the ground), but when that routine starts to get bumpy, we don’t trust more, but we run away. Even though the elevator has proved to be true, through bumps and shakes, we get out and search for something that seems more stable because we chose it—we have that control.

I find myself trying to control everything. I want to be the determiner of my own future. I want to fix everything. I want to redeem past follies and save my dear cousin. But I can’t do ANY of that. It’s not up to me.

I think it’s time I stop running away from the shaky ground and recognize that there is a Rock that holds strong regardless of how uncertain circumstance my seem.

Unfortunately, I can’t accept it as simply as it sounds, so for the time being, I still rely on the elevator of choice, the smooth ride.