How Extraordinary
It is easy to live the extraordinary. Christmas Day with its joy and cheer. New Year’s Eve with its Aud Lang Syne.
But then there’s the ordinary. How do we find the magic when your mountain peaks give way to valleys, when your “Ho Ho Ho” bleeds into a “Ho-hum” kind of life?
The answer just may be in this: finding what is extraordinary in the ordinary.
Centuries ago, a group of God’s people gathered together to talk. The story I’m referring to is recorded in Malachi 3:16. “Then the people who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord listened and heard what they said.”
Did you catch that? In the quiet moment when two sisters express their care and concern for one another, promising to be there for each other and reminding one another of God’s goodness and provision, there is a heavenly onlooker who joins the conversation. “The LORD listened and heard what they said.”
And that’s not all. When God’s people gather to tell one another the good things the LORD has done for them, God is so taken that he wants it recorded for all of posterity. Here is the rest of the verse: “In his presence, there was written down in a book a record of those who feared the Lord and respected him.”
Could it be? Could it be that even our small gatherings (from church, to small group, to a cup of coffee with a dear friend) might seem like ho-hum events, but what if what is really happening is beyond our wildest comprehension?
When Elisha’s servant boy got up early one morning to wash his eyes, he looked up and saw nothing but a wall of horses and chariots holding the enemies of Israel, surrounding the city. He cried out “Oh no, my lord, what shall we do?”
“What shall we do?” answered back the prophet of Jehovah God’s holy, special, chosen people. “Are you kidding me? The King of Aram sends out a crew, and that’s all you see? Who is the king of Aram and his minions? You can count ‘em if you want. But don’t you see? Lift up your eyes. Those who are with us are far more than those who are with them” (see 2 Kings 6:15-16).
Even God’s people sometimes need a little reminding of just who we are, who’s we are, and what is really going on behind the scenes. So Elisha prayed, “Oh Lord, open his eyes, so that your servant may see.”
And do you know what that servant boy saw when he looked around? He saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire surrounding them all. Did God suddenly show up to help them in trouble? Not on your life. He was there before the enemy even advanced. The boy just needed eyes to see it.
C. S. Lewis once famously said “there are no ordinary people.” For the believer—who against all odds is now somehow already seated with Christ in heavenly places, set to judge angels, and destined to partake of the divine nature—there are no ordinary moments either.
At least not as we think of ordinary. God is in our midst. Every day. In every way.
How…extraordinary.
-Nathan Guy