Hangin' Out in Karongue

Hangin' Out in Karongue

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Glorifying God in the Ordinary

There is nothing wrong with being ordinary. As a matter of fact, that is the likely category that most of us find ourselves in: ordinary. We are ordinary people, with ordinary jobs, who are part of ordinary families, living out ordinary lives.

But the extraordinary thing about God is that He intends to inject His glory into the ordinariness of our lives. With God nothing is just ordinary because He intends to be glorified in all areas and facets of our lives; including the ordinary.

Paul understood this point when he wrote, “Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). Eating and drinking are the epitome of ordinary; quite mundane actually. Yet in even these things I have the capacity to glorify God because all of life is meant to be about Him and for Him. And think about the “whatever you do” part. Paul is saying that the glorifying of God is not limited to certain “spiritual” tasks or activities, but is possible in everything.

In much the same way Paul writes to the Colossian Christians and says, “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus” (Colossians 3:17). The “whatever” of this verse is broad enough to totally encompass your “ordinary” life.

This means that you do not have to be a pastor or a missionary or have some other “spiritual” vocation to please God with your life. God is glorified in the lives of businessmen who maintain Christian ethics in their business and honor Him with their profession. He is glorified in the tradesman who puts in an honest day’s work and seeks to work “heartily as to the Lord and not to men” (Colossians 3:23). God is exalted in the life of the stay-at-home mom who nurtures, loves, and instructs her children. God delights in the teachers who love their students and live out the Gospel before them day-in and day-out. Secretaries, students, salesmen, servers, and a whole host of other “ordinary” people truly have the capacity to glorify God with their lives as they live for Jesus.

This also means that there is an urgency to all of our work. We are not waiting to do God’s work; whatever God has set before us is God’s work! If we sit and wait for something better that is more “spiritual” or “important” and less ordinary then we may miss the thing that God is calling us to that is right before our eyes.

Missionary James Fraser learned this valuable lesson as he was language learning in China. He wrote: “It is all if and when. I believe the devil is fond of those conjunctions … The plain truth is that the Scriptures never teach us to wait for opportunities of service, but to serve in just the things that lie next at our hands … Since the things that lie in our immediate path have been ordered of God, who shall say that one kind of work is more important and sacred than another?”

His point is that what lies before us is the work of God. While we have a tendency to separate life into “sacred” and “secular” compartments, the Bible makes no such distinction. The “whatever you do” of 1 Corinthians and Colossians destroys those compartments and makes everything the work of God whereby God can by glorified. Fraser goes on to write: “I am no more doing the Lord’s work in giving the Word of God to the Chinese than you are, for example, in wrapping up a parcel to send to the tailor. It is not for us to choose our work. And if God has chosen it for us, hadn’t we better go straight ahead and do it, without waiting for anything greater, better, or nobler?” He is saying that the most “noble” work that God can call you to is the work that God has called you to. He is saying that with God there is really no such thing as ordinary.

So go and live out your “ordinary” life. But do it in a way that points others to your extraordinary God!

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