Feeling Ordinary? Uzorak

Don’t Despise Ordinary Things 

I almost got depressed the other day in church. As I was preaching, I said, “After six years as your pastor, I have preached 200-300 sermons in this church. Show of hands—how many of you remember all of them? Half of them? One hundred of them? Ten of them? Any of them?” I wish I could tell you that excited hands filled the air with each question, but the air stayed empty until a smattering of people reacted to my final question.

I was almost depressed. It takes me 10-15 hours to prepare each sermon, so I had spent 2,000 - 4,500 hours on those messages. And only a few people remembered a few of the things I said. Ugh.

But, thankfully, God reminded me that he loves to work through ordinary things. Defenseless toddlers become strong teenagers through 10,000 meals that they will mostly forget. And children of God become strong in their faith through 300 sermons whose themes they won’t be able to name. That’s okay. In fact, that keeps us humble and ensures that God gets the glory.

Like me, you will do a lot of good things that people won’t remember in a few years . . . or hours. But don’t get depressed. The prophet Zechariah once wrote, “Who dares despise the day of small things?” (Zechariah 4:10). In the kingdom of God, small things do great things. Don’t despise them, even if others forget them. 

What small thing might God be using in your life today?