The Ordinary

When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus. Acts 4:13 (NIV)

There are so many times I want to blend in with the crowd. I don’t want to be recognized or singled out for any reason. My desire is to be ordinary! God has other plans and puts me right up front (choir director, teacher, etc.) Sometimes I feel like we are playing hide and seek. It is uncanny how He always finds my hiding spots. Darlene Kerr (All God’s Creatures) has an anything but ordinary message for us.

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I felt a surge of joy when I saw an American robin fly past me with a twig in its beak. It was a mini taste of the joy Noah must have felt when the dove returned to the ark with an olive leaf. Noah endured the flood and its aftereffects for more than a year. And I had finally gotten past the 88 days of winter.

The robin’s nest building put an image to the clear, lilting song I’d been hearing over the past 2 weeks. Some people describe a robin’s delightful string of clear whistles as saying: Cheerily, cheer up, cheer up, cheerily, cheer up.

An engaging song. One of the early broadcasters of spring. Hooray for robins! Yet robins are often underappreciated and dismissed. I’ve heard it thoughtlessly slip out of people’s mouths (mine included), “Oh, it’s just a robin.” Perhaps the attitude is not surprising since nearly one out of 30 birds in North America is a robin.

Likewise, how many individuals are overlooked within the teeming mass of humanity. There are now more than 8 billion people on earth. Most live quiet lives in humble circumstances. Not fabulously wealthy. Not so beautiful, brilliant, or talented. Lives lived outside the limelight.

Thankfully, God has a much larger view. In the Bible, we read of ordinary people whose lives were weaved into the extraordinary plan of God. Consider the poor immigrant Ruth, Rahab the prostitute, and an unnamed boy with five loaves and two fishes.

Isn’t it exciting to know that God’s extraordinary can and does intersect with the ordinary? The same God who created robins to proclaim spring likewise created us to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ in the setting and circumstances in which He’s placed us. Like Peter and John, I have the imprint of Jesus on my life. Suddenly, my ordinary no longer feels, well, quite so ordinary.

The only way to live a truly remarkable life is not to get everyone to notice you, but to leave noticeable marks of His love everywhere you go.   —Ann Voskamp

We’ve a Story to Tell to the Nations

Father God, thank You for reminding us that we, as Your children, will never be ordinary in Your eyes. AMEN.