Tag: small things (Page 2 of 2)

Learning to Live Fearlessly (guest post)

August 23, 2013 /

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Sarah Wineland (on the left, with her sister in this picture) is one of my delightfully brave friends.  Actually she was Maggie and Katy’s friend first, but they have generously shared her with me :)!  I asked her to guest post on this Fearless Friday.  Enjoy!

My first brave moment came when I was 13 at a summer camp.  We were whitewater rafting and had stopped at a large jumping rock. Being the timid, quiet child that I was, I didn’t want to jump. A counselor encouraged me to “just try it,” and the experience was exhilarating and indelibly life-changing.  I suddenly realized I couldn’t let fear keep me from experiencing a full life.  Life was meant to be lived vibrantly, and safety wasn’t necessarily the best route. I decided to live more daringly and face my fears head-on.   (Residual effects of this decision have included: eating various bugs, learning to be vulnerable, taking more chances, living in several countries, taking a job doing maintenance on septic tanks, climbing the Grand Teton, and leading worship.)

In my adult life, I haven’t always succeeded at living fearlessly.  I tend to be risk-averse and a people-pleaser, at times avoiding conflict.  Back in December, a friend of mine insisted that I watch this TED talk about vulnerability by Brene Brown, and it sparked something in my brain.  Like my summer camp experience, it reminded me that I live too fearfully, too timidly, in my approach to the world and other people. I needed to find strength to jump off of those proverbial rocks into the river.  So I determined that 2013 would be my year of living fearlessly.  I would aim to do something that scared me at least once a week, with the hope that fearlessness would become a lifestyle.

It started with the little things.   Continue reading

Fear, Small Things, and a Big God

August 16, 2013 /

One of the ways God reassures me is to say “do not despise the day of small things.”*  He uses the ordinary, and the overlooked, and the seemingly inconsequential.  And even the things He does with these can go overlooked.  Unnoticed.

I used to think that if it was “of God” it had to be big and bold and dramatic and flashy.  Like a super hero.  But then I learned that if he can use flour and oil, and widows, and dropouts, there’s hope for me.  I’m thankful for that, because my life is mostly a life of “small things”.

But lately I’ve been convicted that I’ve gone too far.  I’m settling for too little. I’m settling for a small god, instead of the real thing.   It’s not me who’s flashy and dramatic, but I can trust in God to do amazing things through me, beyond my ability.

Sometimes He wants to do big things.

Continue reading

Invitations of the Scary Kind

February 26, 2013 /

I wrote yesterday about how I don’t see myself usually as the cowabunga-bungee-jumping for Jesus type.

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But I am trying to be a person that responds to whatever God invites me into.

Sometimes that’s leaning in to hear a whisper and being obedient in one of the million small invitations from God in daily life.

But sometimes there are big scary invites that take us off-guard.

They are as clear as a public marriage proposal booming over the loud-speaker at the Twins Stadium.  And that can be the most disconcerting kind.

So when I got a request to go teach a class to seminary students in middle-of-nowhere-rural Northern Kenya I wanted to put on Bose head phones to drown it out. (Yes. They are clearly desperate.)

I’ve never taught a seminary course and I’ll be alone without John, my best coach in all things challenging.  So the refrain in my head is “Ican’t/I’mnot/Ican’t/I’mnot…”

But like I’ve written before, I’m not, but He is.  And I really can’t ignore this, even though it makes me quake in my boots (or in my TOMS as the case may be).

And I’m inspired by some friends of mine who are responding to an much bigger crazy invite…adopting two orphans from the D.R.C.  You know, Congo, where there’s been horrendous gender violence (that means rape and worse) and warfare and the perfect storm of natural disaster, poverty, and evil.  And yes, you read right.  Two, yes two kids, with two more at home.

This is a big invitation that God has confirmed in both their hearts from the time they were dating until now.  Through scary developments and uncertainty they are trusting God to knit together a loving family of American born biological kids with Congolese babies abandoned out of desperation.

But there are also invitations of a different kind.  Big invitations to rest, that come in the form of end-of-your-rope-exhaustion and require you to say “no” may be just as scary and as the invitations to jump.

Here’s the thing…I don’t think we’re ready to say “yes” to any of the “bigger”, riskier things unless we’ve said “yes’ on the days of small things.

Would David have been ready to say “yes” to God’s invitation to fight Goliath, if he hadn’t said “yes” to the ordinary, boring, everyday stuff of protecting his sheep before that?

Would Elijah have had the courage to say “yes” to a showdown with the prophets of Baal if he hadn’t trusted God to provide food and water before that?

Would Daniel have been prepared to defy Darius when push came to shove if he hadn’t quietly been honoring God daily before that?

So as I prepare to send the email responding to the loud scary-big invite in my life, I’m trying to say “yes” to the whispers of today.  And I’m praying for my dear friends on their journey to respond to Jesus’ invite to come pick up two toddlers in Congo.

Are there ways you’ve seen God use everyday whisper invitations to prepare you for loud riskier ones?

Kingdom Come Small

February 20, 2013 /

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is “Who has despised the day of small things?” (Zechariah 4:10)

It’s comforting.

It feels like a personal p.s. after all the flashy miraculous fire-and-rain-prophets-of-baal-showdowns.  Like God’s saying “That’s not the whole story.  And you, even you – person of small things – have a part to play in my kingdom capers.”

I feel reassured by this.  This reminder that in the economy of God there really are no small things.

It makes me think of Bill. Bill with two artificial knees, one artificial hip, and steel in his spine and in a worldly sense, a person of small things.

Bill is a fixture at our church.  A remarkable man with a remarkable gift of hospitality and a servant’s heart.  Rain, sleet, or snow he is out in the parking lot in his orange vest, directing traffic, or holding the door for someone or helping someone out of a car.

Don’t despise the day of small things.

For the past 5-6 weeks there has been an older gentleman coming to the early Sunday service at our church in a cab. He uses a walker and his name is Vic.

This past Sunday he was waiting for the cab sitting on the heat register in the entryway after church.

As the cab pulled up, Bill opened the car door for Vic.  He started to get in and cab driver came and took his walker to put in trunk.

Ollie, (another greeter on Spirit steroids and person of small things) said “Hi” to the driver, asked him his name. And then, “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Don’t despise the day of small things.

The driver, Ali, a Muslim gentleman, helped get Vic strapped in back seat, and Ollie came back with a cup of hot coffee, saying “Be careful, it doesn’t have a lid.”

The driver said “thanks” and drove away.

Don’t despise the day of small things.

Such small things!  No big deal.

But what if…

What if this was the first gesture of kindness this Muslim man experienced at a Christian church?

What if Ali told his friends about this faith community and it was the beginning of a bridge?

What if the care Vic received was the only gracious encounter of his day?

What if a cup of coffee, or an open door, or a welcoming smile was part of a much bigger thing God was at work doing?

What small opportunities has God given you to be part of His work in the world?

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“Small things” and “Great work”

January 18, 2012 /

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about two verses in the Old Testament that sound like they should be mutually exclusive.  

A verse that I love is one where the Old Testament prophet Zechariah warns us not to “despise the day of small things.”  (Zech. 4:10).

I’m thankful for this reminder.  My days are almost always days of “small things”.  I’m tempted to consider mine a pretty superfluous life…To think nothing I’m doing adds up to anything with eternal consequences.

Conversely I consider my husband and the things he’s doing, and I often think of the second verse that’s been on my mind, Nehemiah 6:3 “I am doing a great work and can’t come down.”  You look at his life and you can clearly see great work he’s invested in.  He has the privilege of caring for the poor around the world.  Leading institutional change in the church.  Investing in eternity through ministry to thousands at our church.

But what if the small things are also the great work of God?

What if there’s “Great work” that looks like great work, but there’s also great work that never gets a shout out?  What about people around the world who are humbly, faithfully, offering gifts of grace…

on dusty roads,

in conversations at coffee shops,

next to strangers at airports,

in school classrooms,

in office conference rooms

What about all the small decisions just to remain faithful?  To put one foot in front of another?

What days in the Bible seemed like throw aways?  Days of small things that didn’t really matter?

The day David did the task of leaving his sheep to bring bread to his important brothers who were doing the “great work” of fighting Goliath and the Philistines?

The day Ruth left her home to travel with her mother-in-law to Bethlehem and start a new life?

The day the widow of Zarephath used the last of her flour and oil to make a meal for Elijah?

The day Mary and Martha opened their home to Jesus?

What if parents crept into their children’s rooms while they were asleep and prayed over them, saying “It may seem like a small thing, but I am doing a great work and I can’t come down.”?

What if businessmen and bus drivers and baristas and teachers and techies sealed their resolve each day to do the small things as Jesus would with the refrain, “I’m doing a great work and I can’t come down.”?

The other day a woman approached John and told him about a friend of hers who she had invited to church for the first time.  The friend walked in and saw that John was the pastor she started to cry in utter amazement, at the personal care of God.

She said that she had been on a flight from Seattle to Minneapolis having a terrible day and was in tears (apparently this woman has been crying a lot lately).  A man on the flight noticed and asked if she was ok.  At the end of the conversation he said, “I’d be happy to pray for you.”  When she walked into church for the first time she saw the stranger who had listened and prayed for her on that flight.  It was John.

In God’s economy, this small thing may be a greater work than all the more high profile things.

A small thing that has the potential to be a “great work” of God.

You never know…

What’s a small thing in your day that may become a great work of God?

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