Category Archives: Sacred Mundane

For those of you just joining our LiveDifferent Challenges, click the LiveDifferent link under featured to see what we’ve done so far.  Basically, we’re just brainstorming on fun ways to live counter-culture, focusing on creative ways go against the grain of materialism, consumerism, and selfish waste.  I always love hearing your ideas, so send ’em in!

Apparently the library bug is in full force, because I was reading Caila’s blog and she had just posted “Library Lover“, then spoke with another friend who said she was loving her local library this summer. So, perhaps ya’ll are already there, but–surprise–this challenge is to patronize, that is, become a patron, of your local library.

Tonight right before dinner Jeff and I took Dutch in to the library.  The fabulous kid’s park is in the same block, so it makes for a fun destination.  As we walked into the library (which is actually very impressive for such a small town), I took a deep breath of the familiar, intoxicating musty smell of books–Ahh!!  I love that smell.  Now that Dutch is such a book fan, trips to the library are even more fun, as he loves to sift through the big picture books, or even pull the “big kid” novels off the shelves and pretend to read.

Besides the traditional use of the library–going and spending lots of time searching and sifting through titles (which is still a sacred experience if you ask me), there is another way that I’m loving now that I’m a busy mom–online requests.  I can go online, search by title or author or subject, and put up to ten titles on hold, from anywhere in our county.  Then I can just walk in, give them my card, get my huge stack of books, and be out in 2 minutes.  This is amazing!  Our other favorite thing is the movies.  Who needs Blockbuster, and paying almost $4 per movie when you can get them for free at your library, and keep them for a week instead of the measly 1 or 2 days that Blockbuster and Hollywood allot.  True, it’s hard sometimes to get recent titles, but again–try out the online request. Early this morning Jeff requested Spiderman 3…and it was sitting there waiting for us when we arrived at 4:30pm.  I looked online and there were no other copies available by that time in the entire county–so consider reserving ahead if you want good titles!

So anyway, libraries are really a no-brain way to save money and enjoy a risk-free way to read and watch wonderful literature and movies.  I’m excited for the days when Dutch will be ready to go to library story times, or when he can go himself and pick out books to read.  Growing up we lived at the library.  We went there every week, and read everything we could get our hands on. Plus, my mom donated so many books that they gave her a no-late-fee status so even if we were bad about getting them back we never had to pay a cent! 🙂

So check it out.  At least go there and take a deep breath, inhale that heavenly scent, and relish the fact that you can walk out with a stack of books and movies without paying a dime. Make it a habit.  Patronize the place. If you really go hog wild you can even pay $1 and get an “I love my library” sign to put in your yard.  Or not…it’s up to you.

Often when people, at least Christians, are asked, “What’s your favorite book?” such as on Facebook, etc. there is the obligatory “Well, the Bible of course, and then…” and then the list of real books begins.  But really, I think that too often I take for granted that in my own possession I have the Bestselling Book of all time, the most reprinted, the most widely translated, the most preserved from antiquity.  And not only that, I have, in my hands, the very words that claim they are breathed by God.  How sad that it is sometimes not celebrated, and truly loved and enjoyed for all its worth.

The last few weeks, I’ve really fallen in love with God’s Word all over again.  I’ve mentioned before that I read through the Bible each year, just straight through Genesis to Revelation, January to December. There are lots of neat little reading plans that dabble in the Law, Psalms, New Testament all at once, but they just confuse me and I’m pretty much a straight-through kinda girl.  One book at a time.  So usually, just because I really do love to read my Bible, I usually find myself getting ahead and finishing early.  Well not this year. I don’t have any sort of official plan, because I’ve been doing this for ten years and by now I don’t keep track of anything I just read.  But I had a hunch that I was slacking so I looked up online to see where I should be if I’m on track and let’s just say I am WAY behind.  WAY behind.  Hm.  There’s no condemnation in this, it doesn’t make me any less valuable of a Christian and certainly doesn’t mean that God loves me any less, but what it tells me is that I’m consuming less of God’s supernaturally transforming words than I have in the past ten years.  I’m thankful for this check.  I like measurable things like that because it helps keep me on my toes.

So the past few weeks, I’ve been digging in. Perfectly, and I believe divinely orchestrated by God, I’m in the Psalms.  Impeccable timing.   I’ve been whining, rejoicing, crying, praying, pleading, questioning, praising, despairing, and wondering with David, Asaph, and the other Psalmists.  And I’ve been reminded again at why this is the bestselling book of all time–because it speaks directly to our human condition.  There is nothing that transforms my life like God’s Word. There is nothing that comforts, nothing that heals, nothing that opens my heart to be purged and cleansed and renewed like God’s Word.  It’s like dialing up the telephone to God and letting Him hear my voice, listening to His, and letting the peace that surpasses understanding come and fill my heart.  This is why I love God’s Word.

So this might be super cheesy, but just as I gave some Fiction recommendations, I’d like to share some of the Psalm passages that have been ministering to me.  Also, if you’d like recommendations on Bible-reading helps, visit Jeff’s blog. He just finished teaching a class on enjoying the Bible for all its worth, and he posted resources for his students.  (Click here!) Back to the Psalms…

Psalm 5:11-12 “But let all those rejoice who put their trust in You; Let them ever shout for joy because You defend them; Let those also who love Your name be joyful in You, For You, O Lord, will bless the righteous; with favor you will surround him as with a shield.”

Psalm 16:5-6 “O Lord, You are the portion of my inheritance and my cup; You maintain my lot. The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places; Yes I have a good inheritance.”

Psalm 31: 14-15a “But as for me, I trust in You, O LORD; I say, “You are my God.” My times are in Your hand.”

Psalm 43:5 “Why are you cast down, O my soul?  And why are you disquieted within me?  Hope in God.  For I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God.”

Psalm 51:17 “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart–these O God, You will not despise.”

Consider re-reading the book you already own, the Bestselling Book of all time.

Really nothing deep and significant here.  Really.  Since we’re unofficially on the topic of books this week, and fiction books so far, I’m wondering why there cannot be a short-legged heroine.  I am not short, in fact I’m tall for a woman, but I have a very long torso and therefore, relative to my torso, shorter legs. I’m ok with it.  I’ve come to grips with the fact that I will never be described as “leggy”.  However, I’m a bit disappointed in the fact that in all the fiction books I’ve read (and of course, all the movies I’ve seen) I’ve yet to see a short-legged heroine.  I’ve seen skinny, full, blonde, brunette. clever, air-headed…but I’ve yet to see one with a long torso and short legs.  Even Shrek’s wife Fiona, who won my heart by being plump and green, you must admit has a pretty lengthy set of legs on her, even if they are no doubt chubby.  I’ve read five or six Rosamunde Pilcher books recently (whom I adore) and I must say that I’ve begun to notice, with a little irritation, that all the female main characters are described as having long legs, or leggy, or skinny spindly legs.  Hm.  I suppose this is just the way life is.  Short-legged girls don’t stand a chance at being the heroine.  It’s too bad because there are some good ones of us out here.  Can I get an amen?  That’s all for tonight. 🙂

Last night I had another emotional-break down (they are pretty much becoming the norm around here…hmmm…).  I was so depressed as we looked through the Multnomah placement booklet and saw NO local pastoral jobs available except for ones that wanted 5-8 years of previous pastoral experience (even for associate pastors!).  This coupled with just the rain (it’s August!), spending way too much time stuck at home with no car, feeling too nauseaus to cook but having to anyway, and then being frustrated that my body betrayed me by being overcome with an insane craving (pregnancy cravings are truly like monsters taking over your body) for Costco lattice-topped apple pie.  Of course we cannot make the hour-long drive to Costco (which was closed at this time anyway) for an apple pie.  Then someone stopped by to visit and it’s getting to the point where I hate seeing people I haven’t seen in a long time because they always want to know “So, what are you guys up to now?” and I have to say again, “Nothing.  We can’t find a job. Nothing.”   And here’s the real part (I know, I am a very ugly person on the inside), it was one of those people whose life looks perfect–perfect kids, nice car, mansion of a house, good job, etc. etc. Hugely shallow weakness on my part, I know, but it just made me feel like that much more of a loser.

Anyway, after putting Dutch to bed, Jeff suggested we watch a movie on TV.  We found one one I’d never seen: Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events with Jim Carrey.  Really bizarre, but strangely captured our attention right away, and I found myself frustrated by commercials because I was really intrigued.  At the end, of course, these three brave orphaned children have survived the villianous Count Olaf attempting to kill them time and time again, and each time they were in a seeminly impossible circumstance and death was imminent, fearless Violet would tie her hair up in a bow and say, “there’s always something.” There’s always something that can be done, no matter how desperate the circumstance.  There’s always something.  And as the movie ended, the children saw how really fortunate they truly were, to have each other, even in the midst of a series of unfortunate events.  I knew, silly as it sounds, the message was for me.

This morning we overslept, and all three raced out the door, carrying bowls of cereal, Dutch still in his pajamas, me without a shower or combed hair, because I was supposed to meet a friend for coffee in the big town, and Jeff thought he and Dutch would come along and find a park or something.  After driving thirty minutes, just before we got to the coffee shop, I got a text for her saying she couldn’t make it.  Surprisingly, we looked at each other, and realized that we now had an excuse to be in town, together, with our son, on a special date just the three of us, a family.  We got some Starbucks, then went to the park, a fabulous preschool park at a local Christian school, where Dutch played to his heart’s content, climbing, sliding, swinging, driving boats, playing house.

Then Jeff thought Dutch had a poopy diaper (and we hadn’t brought any fresh ones), and since we were almost out at home, we figured we might as well go to Costco and get the diapers, wipes, the whole deal.  When we walked in we realized that Jeff had been desperately needing new glasses, but we kept saying we couldn’t do it until we got a job.  Well, something clicked inside and we realized this was the perfect time.  We went to the optomotrist–no appointments open today. But wait, the girl said, they just had a cancellation–could Jeff come in right now?  Um, yes!  Jeff got a new prescription, fabulous new glasses for a great price, and Dutch and I had the fun of perusing through Costco, in no hurry, eating tons of free samples and looking at kids’ books.  Then I remembered…apple pie!  I had totally forgotten!  I happily and with no guilt, marched over and there they were…lattice-topped apple pies (let it be known I have never bought a store-bought pie in my life…this is not an every day occurance).  I smiled to myself realizing that God had this wonderful morning all planned out for us, and we didn’t even know it.

On the drive home I thought about our morning:  The preschool park we’d known nothing about, the cancelled coffee date, the glasses, the apple pie, and sweet hours of treasured time together as a family–really, a kiss from God in the midst of what has been feeling like a series of unfortunate events.  I’m sorry if this post bored you to tears–perhaps it’s a bit pathetic that a morning in town, buying apple pie, is the most exciting thing that has happened to me all week, but I see it as a precious morning of divinely-orchestrated Fortunate Events.  Thank you, Father.

Dutch is pooping blue.  Really.  Sorry, that’s gross, I know, but I want you to understand the enormous quantity of blueberries that this boy is consuming.  He eats them by the pound.  I’ll make no comment about my digestive system, but I’ve been eating quite a few myself, as they are the only healthy thing that doesn’t make my stomach turn right now.

So last week I finally succumbed and paid the ridiculous price for 2 pounds of blueberries-and that was at Winco!  I almost bought some raspberries at Thriftway, as they’re my favorite, but dropped the teeny ½ carton as if it’d burned my hand when I saw the sign saying $4/carton.  It was only about a handful of berries!

So, after a few days bemoaning the rising food costs, I was seated amongst some girls at a playdate, and asked, “Does anybody know where I can pick blueberries?!”  Becky, who hosted the date, got a funny look on her face and just pointed toward the road.  At that moment I realized how silly my question was because I knew that they had bush after bush of fresh blueberries-they’d given us some last year.  I had totally forgotten that though, so here I was looking as if I’d planted a question in order to get free blueberries again.  Anyway, I explained that my brain failed me quite often these days, but they insisted that we come back out and pick berries, for free.  The next morning Jeff and Dutch and I came back and picked two huge mixing bowls brim full of berries (actually I only picked one, Becky came and helped me and picked the other one herself).  What generosity!

Then, another dear friend overheard me talking about blueberries, and she picked me a big carton full of them herself.  She also cut out the section in the local paper that lists all the places to pick local berries, at super amazing deals.  Then the first family, five days later, picked us another huge plastic bag full of them!  Three cheers for generous blueberry-plant-owners!

So, between our garden (which is limping along in its own pretty pathetic way) and berry farms and generous friends, we are enjoying the produce of the land rather abundantly this year.  I planted five pots of basil and have made batch after batch of heavenly homemade pesto with pine nuts and parmesan.  This mixed with rotini pasta with more freshly shredded parmesan, whole pine nuts, and dried cranberries is absolutely spectacular.

So, we all know that to buy local and pick fresh is the earth-friendly way to do things. It can also be cost-effective, if you pick things yourself and plan ahead, canning or freezing extra so you can enjoy all winter long.  Eating local produce can also be much healthier, as there is less travel time for food to lose valuable nutrients, and often food is organic without the expensive green sticker.  Supporting local farmers is also a worthwhile cause, and the joy of sharing produce–giving and receiving–brings people together.  Berry pick with a friend, get together to can or freeze fruit, make freezer jam (I’m scared of canning but freezing and freezer jam is super easy), or bake yummy berry breads and muffins and freeze them for quick treats reheated in the microwave.

Summer is the perfect time to skip the supermarket.  Buy it local, pick it fresh!

Has John Piper ever NOT hit a homerun with any book he’s written?  I tell you, the guy amazes me.  If ever I need the truth, the real stuff, the perspective that takes me away from the fluff of our cultural Christianity and back to the truth of God’s Word, it’s him (and the Bible, of course!).

You’d think I’d turned into Jeff for all the dabbling I’m doing in different books–that is not my character. I’m a serial monogamous reader, Jeff is a polygamous reader.  (I stick with one book to the end then move to another, Jeff reads about 10 at a time…all stacked on the nightstand by our bed).  At any rate, I opened up a book of Piper’s called The Hidden Smile of God, a book about the fruit of affliction in the lives of John Bunyan, William Cowper, and David Brainerd.  Bunyard and Brainard I was somewhat familiar with, but I hadn’t even heard of Cowper.  But listen to this hymn, perhaps you know it, written by a man whose life was filled with grief and sorrow.

Deep in unfathomable mines

of never failing skill,

He treasures up His bright designs

and works His sovereign will.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,

but trust Him for His grace;

behind a frowning providence

He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,

unfolding every hour;

the bud may have a bitter taste

but sweet will be the flower.

Blind unbelief is sure to err,

and scan His work in vain:

God is His own interpreter,

and He will make it plain. 

Behind a frowning providence, He hides a smiling face.  Be encouraged today by the hidden smile of God. 

If you’re just now joining this blog family, it may seem a little silly, but to those of you who have followed this journey over the past year, I think you understand why I’m truly celebrating.  Today marks one year of blogging at karipatterson.com.  So why is this so significant?

The Journey

About 13 months ago, my husband, son and I left our wonderful home, friends, and job to move in with my parents so that we could finish seminary.  It had become impossible for Jeff to work full-time, go to school, commute 1.5 hours each way to class, and then even begin to think about being a husband and father.  I knew there was no way I could finish my last full-time semester of classes without lots of childcare, and the idea of driving 1.5 hours to my parents’ house, dropping Dutch off, then driving another hour to school, take classes all day, then retrace the 2.5 hour drive again was just crazy.  So, we decided to take a leap of faith and rent out our house, sell 3/4 of everything we owned, saving only very special or sentimental furniture and belongings, and moved into my parents’ house.  We would then just live on our savings, with little part-time jobs as TAs and tutors to help with tuituion costs, and pray that down the road God would open up another door to walk through when the time came.  At that time we figured Jeff had 2 years left, but we only had enough savings to live on for one year…so we decided to go for it for a year, and then pray that God would open up a door for him to work, hopefully in a ministry setting, and finish school, since by then I would be done (except for one class) and we wouldn’t have the same time stressers. 

The Challenge

A month into this new situation, Jeff realized that without having a home, I would soon go crazy. As a wife and mom, my home is my outlet, my identity, it’s how I express my heart and love and creativity.  I loved being a stay-at-home mom (and student) and thrived on having people over, opening up our home, and practicing hospitality.  I loved finding creative and inexpensive ways to decorate, organize, and beautify our home.  I was passionate about creating a calm, serene haven for Jeff, where we could hide away from the world and be a family.  I knew this was risky, letting go of all this, knowing that it was probably a pretty big part of my mental health, but I really felt like this was what God had for us.  So Jeff, in his loving wisdom, spent $13 and bought me karipatterson.com, insisting that I take all my creative energies that I used to pour into home, and channel them into writing, which was my first creative passion anyway.  I knew nothing about blogging (and still don’t), but it quickly became an amazing way for me to articulate my heart, share my thoughts, struggles, insights, failures, and victories, and forced me to be thinking creatively. 

The Result

I wish I could say I’ve come through this past year with flying colors.  Honestly, I’ve more limped through it–failure interspersed with occasional victories.  It’s been a rough year.  And I wish I could say I’m writing from the other side now, looking back, but I’m not. I’m still in it.  We’re praying God provides a job now so we can move out and prepare for the birth of our second child.  I am still struggling with being here. I feel like I die a thousand little deaths each day, of pride, of control, of identity.  But I feel like significant things have been birthed through this blog–insights I’ll carry with me forever, stories I even hope to revise and put into book form to share with our children, raw journal entries that expose the desperate states we travel through on this journey of sanctification. 

And I’ve met so many of you.  I know this blog is still small beans, but my goal is not numbers–my goal is that through writing my own life, and prayerfully a few other lives, would be changed for His glory.  I started out averaging 2 readers per day (myself and Jeff!)…today we’re averaging 60. I share that because that makes me praise my Father for His goodness and grace, for Him providing a bridge for me, with others, while I’m stranded out here with no car, in the boonies. 🙂

And what I really want to say today is THANK YOU.  Thank you for reading, for cheering me on, for adding comments, disagreements, challenges, confirmations.  Thanks for joining me along the journey, for not throwing up your hands in disgust when I stumble, but for chugging along with me on the road.  I pray that this year is filled with God’s supernatural abundant grace on our lives–that we’d be changed into His likeness, from strength to strength.  Thanks for reading. 

A fun little article from goingtoseminary.com for anyone trying to balance everything at once…

I’m really excited to have another opportunity to speak at a Women’s Retreat, in about a month, this time for my beloved church where Jeff and I each attended for 5-7 years before and after we were married.   It’s been four years now that we’ve been gone and often I reminisce of our sweet days there.  It’ll be a treat and I’m so thankful for this opportunity. 

I don’t want to give away all that I’m talking about (just in case you might be there!), but something I have been chewing on lately, that’s related, is the idea of trusting God for something.  I hear this a lot, along with believing God for something.  I’m trusting God for and then name a thing that we’re basically just really wanting.  I’ve caught myself doing this a lot–right now I’m trusting God for a job, for a place to live, for money to cover the cost of our baby, etc.  And I think that is really fine, I mean those are the things that I’m concerned about and we’re supposed to lay our cares before the Lord and trust Him with those things.  But I think there might be a subtle difference between trusting God with something and trusting God for something.

For example, if I’m trusting God with our living and job situation, it means that I’m trusting that whatever the outcome, His grace is sufficient and His character demands my faith and trust.  If I’m trusting God for a job, a house, etc. then I’m placing my own expectations on what I think God should do. It’s like I’m subtly twisting God’s arm saying, “Ok God, here’s my faith, now do what I want you to do.”  I’m afraid that I do this way more often that I even realize.

In Scripture, I think we have a few examples that can give us clarity.  First, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego.  They were about to be thrown into the fiery furnace and they trust God with their heated circumstances: “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from your hand, O king.  But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we do not serve your gods.”  Basically, they’re saying, We’re not only trusting God for deliverance out of the fiery furnace, we trust God with our situation and He is God and can do whatever He pleases. 

Of course there are plenty of situations in Scripture where God speaks a promise and then His people believe Him for that thing.  Abraham believed God (sorta) for a son.  But even he faltered because again, when he started only focusing on believing God for something instead of trusting God with His circumstances, he started to build up expectations, which then led to the son of the flesh, Ishmael. 

Maybe some would say that my faith is faltering these days.  Perhaps. But I think it’s more that I’m finally starting to realize that believing God for something is really nothing more than making a wish list, then slapping a holy-sounding word like “belief” or “trust” on it to make my dreams come true.  The sad part is that I think this is the cause of so much of our disappointment with God.  I for one feel a little worn out, I feel like I’ve had one too many disappointments this year and I’m a little tired of it altogther. But I think it’s because of this, trusting God for something instead of trusting God with something.  I won’t lie, I still despearately want a job for us and a place to live and some semblance of normalcy.  But as best as I can, I’m setting my heart to not just trust God for the fulfillment of my own desires but to just trust God. Period. 

Here it is, me being brave.  Some of you know that for about 8 years I’ve wanted to write a book entitled The Sacredness of the Mundane about glorifying God in all of life.  The problem with such an idea is that I’ve been thinking about it for eight years.  To be fair, part of the process is allowing God to write the book in me before I pour the book out of me, but I feel like lately I’ve just been putting it off because it’s far easier to just punch out blog posts and keep things failure-free. 

Last night I was digging around on my computer and I actually found the intro of the book, that I’d written down in San Jose.  I added a paragraph or two and I’m posting it here, not because I think it’s awesome or that it’s the finished product, but to give you an idea of where I’m headed, and get any feedback, ideas, etc.  I’m still a little unsure about exactly what direction I’m going with it, but it will probably be around 10 chapters, each devoted to a different mundane aspect of life (work, home, family, finances, body) and how we can consecrate every detail to God to live for His glory.  So anyway, here’s the intro I found:

———–

I picked the shirt up off the floor for the fourteenth time that day and hung it back on the rack.  I wanted to cry.  What am I doing?  Just weeks earlier my life was filled.  Filled with prayer meetings, ministering to college women, Bible studies, fellowship gatherings, times of worship, retreats, and teaching of God’s Word.  In the course of a month, my husband and I, destined for the ministry adventure of a lifetime in sunny California, found ourselves out of ministry, out of work, living in a windowless cave in a foreign state, and in the midst of very foreign circumstances. 

That shirt I was picking up again was most likely a bright pink Only Nine size 3X boat-neck shirt, the kind that slips off the hanger every two minutes at my new place of employment, Nordstrom Rack.  The jarring difference between life in full-time ministry and life in full-time Bay Area Retail was disconcerting, to say the least.  Now, instead of exhorting college women to store up treasures in heaven, I was half-heartedly advising middle-aged women on which shade of navy complimented their skin-tone.  There were days in which, after hours of picking up that same wide-necked and impossibly slippery shirt up off the floor for the fourteenth time, I thought, “I know that this is all going to burn someday, but I’d actually like to be the one to do it.”

My passion, during our years serving in full-time ministry, was to exhort women that there is sacredness in the mundane.  The Apostle Paul said that “whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God,”¹ and I was convinced that it doesn’t get much more basic and mundane than eating and drinking.  Therefore, it seems logical to deduce that if Paul told us to eat and drink for the glory of God, then it must be possible for us to do all things to the glory of God.  If anything matters, everything matters.  This is the sacrament of life.  I was passionate about instilling into college women that all of life is sacred and meant to be lived out to the fullest for the glory of God.  I talked about this, taught about this, and prayed about this-and knew that God intended me to eventually write to you about this. 

When our life turned upside down in California, it seemed that my husband and I had been “shelved.”  My biggest fear, always, had been that somehow I would mess things up or miss God’s will or get in the way, and be therefore deemed unworthy of God’s use, set upon the shelf of has-been ministers, whose pride or ignorance kept them from being useful to God.  We had followed God to California out of obedience.  I knew that.  We didn’t want to move there in the first place, but sensed through months of prayer and fasting, that we were to leave our house, parents, family, friends, and successful ministry, and start from scratch in a spiritually cold and desolate city in the heart of Silicon Valley.  This made the catapult out of ministry and into the “real world” that much harder, because I somehow feared that I had “messed up” in some way, or become too puffed up with pride, or too hindering to God’s work, and He had therefore sentenced me to a lifetime of plus-sized fashions at Nordstrom Rack. 

However, God in His graciousness cleared my clouded vision, and reminded me of His love.  This passion He had instilled in me for his glory, for the sacredness of the mundane, needed to be tested, tried, and proved through the reality of life, the rains of adversity, and the worldly pressures of Silicon Valley.  What better way to ignite my heart for his glory than to send it through the very valley of the mundane, and to demonstrate, and share with you, like the cheering witnesses of Hebrews 11 that “It can be done, it can be done, this life of faith and godliness can be run.” 

Four years later, I found myself in another set of mundane circumstances that challenged my perspective even more.  Now, instead of working full-time, Jeff and I were living with my parents in order for Jeff to finish seminary, and I was home full-time chasing an 18-month old with another on the way.  I no longer even had the joy of keeping my own home, of expressing myself through the creative outlet of my house-even if all that meant was cleaning and cooking.  My identity was once more stripped away.  Now I was in someone else’s home, changing endless poopy diapers, managing morning sickness and migraines, and wondering how on earth this was for the glory of God.  At least in the work environment I was interacting with people.  Now I was just saying “no-no” for the five-hundredth time and cleaning my parents’ kitchen. 

This one had my stymied. How? How can this be fulfilling, exhilarating work for the Kingdom of God?  My ministry, my home, my friends, my transportation (we only had one car), my freedom, my identity was gone, or so it felt.  How can this painfully mundane life be filled with sacred meaning?  And once again, God began to meet me.  The road was rough, and at times very dark, but He birthed life through a thousand little deaths. 

So now, I challenge you.  If God’s Word commands it, God’s Spirit enables it.  Do you long for the adventure of living a life consumed with passion for the glory of God?  Do you desire divine encounters at the grocery store or in your classes? Do you yearn for something more invigorating than another poopy diaper?  Dare to live every moment for God’s glory and see Him in all that you do.  You will never be the same, and the incorruptible beauty that will radiate forth from your life will reflect His beauty and attract people to the True and Living God who alone can save their souls.  This is the secret that will turn your life from a dreary and habitually discouraging cycle of tediousness, to a joyful and exhilarating pursuit of the glory of God.  This is the sacredness of the mundane.

A note of caution:  Stepping up to the challenge of living every moment for the glory of God causes a shift in the heavenly places and Satan to stand up and take notice.  Our adversary will not kick a dead horse nor afflict those who sit on the sidelines.  Consider Job.  Count the Cost².  If you are willing, step forward and be counted.  The glorious reward is worth any hardship, and our glorious LORD is worthy of our life.  Therefore, “be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.  Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brother hood in the world.  But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory in Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you.  To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.”³