Last week an exciting news story came out that was 30 years in the making. For quite some time there has been much debate about the origins of the universe, but in particular, why does the universe continue to have expanding mass? If there was nothing, then there was something and that mass continues to slowly expand, what creates this phenomenon? The hypothesis by many particle physicists was that a field was created at the advent of the universe that involves a Higgs boson (known as the God particle), that created an invisible field that particles would gain mass as it went through it…sort of like how a pea might gain mass as it travels through molasses.

Essentially, a 10KM circular Hadron collider was built underground in Switzerland and for 30 years, they have been smashing accelerated atomic particles into each other, trying to recreate the God particle, forming probably one of the most expensive and universally sought after experiments for physics since the Manhattan project.

Needless to say, last week was a big day for these scientists.

But for me, it gets more fascinating. You see, it took 30 years to get what they were looking for, but there is more to the story. Along the way, they realized with all of the experiments they were running and all of the data that needed to be poured over and kept, they would need a place to store it. Clearly there is no computer mainframe on earth big enough to keep all of this data. So they invented something else.

The world wide web.

That’s right. They basically invented the internet to store all of this data. They were going after the God particle. And they eventually got it. But they also got the internet. Not just the internet, but they also discovered new medical technology that changed the way we discover illnesses in someone’s body and treat them. It’s absolutely fascinating.

But we’ve heard stories like this before.

Columbus was going for the East Indies and he finds America. A swimmer trains by developing muscles other than those needed for swimming. Penicillin, the drug that would save millions, was discovered through Alexander Fleming observing a a discarded petri dish for another experiment.

Perhaps we can call this coincidence or a fortuitous turn, but I’d argue something else is happening.

It’s the law of indirect effort. And this law is one of the most important things for Christians to understand about their own spiritual development. Sometimes the most helpful ways to see transformation in something we’re looking to redeem isn’t necessarily to go after the thing itself, but to go after something else.

Take pornography, for instance. I’m not a spring chicken anymore, so I’ve seen men wrestle with this epidemic in ministry for over 35 years. And I’ve almost never seen someone overcome this by simply deciding they aren’t going to let themselves look at it anymore and put all of their emotional and spiritual energy into that. However, the people who have seen the most breakthrough tend to be people who fast and give someone else up. Let’s say soda or carbs or coffee, for instance. What they found is that by saying no to the one thing they develop, over time, to ability say no to the other through the grace of the Holy Spirit. As Dallas Willard says, “Say no to the things you have control over so you can say no to the things you can’t say no to.”

It’s indirect effort.

There’s this quote from Shawshank Redemption that is one of the more memorable lines: “Geology is the study of time and pressure. And that’s all it takes, really…time…and pressure…”

In that quote, Red really isn’t talking about geology, but his friend Andy escaping and how time and pressure changes someone. We see indirect effort in all sorts of things.

The Peter we read about in the Gospels is certainly the same character we read about in Acts, yet Peter seems more mature, more redeemed. I’m sure there were times when he thought to himself, “What does it look like for someone like me to live and lead in the Kingdom?” Peter is this gregarious, prone-to-overstatement, ever-changing mood swing. That’s just who he is. How does that factor into the Kingdom? I doubt he knew.

Until Pentecost, and Peter steps up to address the crowd.

Suddenly, the opportunity presented itself and it all starts to make sense. Of course he’s the perfect person to stand up and deliver the proclamation of the Gospel. The parts of him that might have seemed disparate now start to locate themselves in the reality of the Kingdom.

Why?

Time. Pressure. Indirect effort.

Because Jesus, in perhaps his most profound statement ever, taught about indirect effort: “But seek first the Kingdom and his righteousness and everything will be added to you.”

Go after the Kingdom.

Do you want a better marriage? Is there something in ministry you want to learn? Do you need to see financial breakthrough? Are you frustrated? Are you lonely? Are your afraid? Has the vision left your bones? Do you want to grow as a parent? What do you want to see happen?

Seek the Kingdom. The rest will be added. It’s simply the law of indirect effort.