when your world seems small, part 2
With the 500th anniversary of the Reformation fast approaching, we've been taking a closer look at Martin Luther in Sunday Bible class for the past few weeks.
One of our recent studies was on the privilege and joy and responsibility of vocation.
When I read the above quote, my mind immediately went to some words I penned and shared here at Holy Hen House a few Octobers ago:
“Today as I picked up the same toys for the hundredth time and started up the dryer and then drove around doing errands, I thought about my life and how my world can seem so very small.
It stretches from our country house around this horseshoe street into a town that’s a mile wide and a mile long. With two stoplights, mind you, that everyone tries their hardest to avoid. Some days it’s me and my two boys and the mail-lady in her rusted out blue car. Other days, friends and church people and neighbors and town people.
My days are made up of housework and little boy things and church stuff and the like. Small could easily sum things up and tie it with a bow.
Part of me used to think small meant insignificant. Not so important.
But I was wrong.
Because He is here.
In the stack of folded whites. In the hands that scrub pans and smooth blankets at bedtime. In the favorite book that’s read twice and the Candy Land match.
He is in the e-mail to a friend. The Facebook status. The conversation with the operator over the phone. The handwritten note and the donation and the prayers.
He’s in the please and the thank you and the so happy to see you. The knowing smile to the mom with the tantruming toddler in aisle 4. The wave to the old man on the sidewalk.
He’s here when I speak kindly. When I love and serve my husband each day and listen actively to my little one’s ideas and stories. When I compliment the receptionist’s pretty nails. When I invite someone along or stop by just to say hi.
Because everything good and wonderful and beautiful? It’s Him. ALL Him. His handiwork. Jesus takes hold of my smallness, shines brightly through my ordinary and my brokenness and creates exceptional beauty. Small overflows with purpose and influence. Small is made mighty through the victory of Christ.”
A lot has changed in the 4 years since I wrote those words.
My child has grown. We moved across the country. My husband serves a different church. We live in a new neighborhood. I have a teaching job.
But what hasn't changed?
The truth that Jesus brings life to my small tasks and mundane moments. He's given me gifts to serve and work and He expects me to do it faithfully out of love for what he's done for me.
Whatever my role - wife, mother, teacher, neighbor, friend, volunteer, laundry folder, soup-stirrer, chauffeur driver, wall decorator, picker-upper - may I see my worth in my Savior and shine His light in everything I do.
What a joy! What a privilege! That my Lord is delighted to use little me in His Kingdom.
But when I fail, I look to His cross for comfort and forgiveness, and He strengthens me to do the next thing (and the next, and then next).
God be with you, friends, as you do your Kingdom work!
