Finding Holiness in the Ordinary
But you, beloved, build yourselves up in your most holy faith.
Jude 1:20
A couple weeks ago I flew to North Carolina on Friday and returned on Sunday. Both flights departed v-e-r-y early. So early that I had to skip my daily exercise routine for an entire weekend. Secretly, I appreciated having a legitimate reason to play hooky. I told myself it meant more time to meet and minister to hurting parents and network with others who serve special needs families. And to hobnob when the opportunity arose. And to do all of it guilt free.
Reality returned Monday when I resumed the old routine. About halfway through the morning walk that’s normally a breeze, my muscles screamed “Enough already!”
Talk about God’s perfect timing! There I was, walking down an ordinary street in my ordinary town when he used my aching muscles to drive home a point Oswald Chambers made in the devotional I had read just one day early. At the airport. While waiting to board the plane home. Chambers said this:
It is ingrained in us that we have to do exceptional things for God–but we do not. We have to be exceptional in the ordinary things of life, and holy in the ordinary streets, among ordinary people–and this is not learned in five minutes.
At that moment God made his priorities for my life very clear. He considers my faithfulness in the small, daily happenings of life as more valuable than my participation in exceptional events. He wants me to devote the bulk of my time to the ordinary. He calls me and all Christians to see the ordinary as holy.
But how can we frail humans be exceptional in the ordinary things? How can we persevere through the mundane dreariness of daily duties? How do we infuse holiness into the wiping of noses, changing the oil, yard work, visiting elderly neighbors, walking the dog, and punching the time clock at work day after ho-hum day?
The truth is, we can’t do it ourselves. The only way we can do it by asking Jesus to quicken his Spirit within us. To transform us into a people for his own purposes through the consistent practice of the spiritual disciplines he uses to draw us closer to him.
So that through perseverance and faithfulness, we grow strong enough to live like Jesus did during his time on earth. To walk down dusty roads with people who need compassion. To welcome children and the messes they make into our lives. To devote the best part of our days to ministering to the sick, the broken, and the despised. To wake up in the morning ready and willing to do it all over again. To count as holy and exceptional the ordinary work he calls us to complete.
Because if Jesus, the exceptional Creator of the universe, considered the ordinary people and ordinary events worthy of his time and devotion and lifeblood, how can we do anything less?
