Sacred Mundane: The Blog

A couple weeks ago we looked at why God likes the long way. Did I mention He likes corners too?  Yes, we’re past Exodus in our Bible reading, but had to share a quick thought before moving on… Exodus 14 shows us the interesting way that God leads His people:

“Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea” (vv1-2).

First off, God tells them to turn around and go back.  Oops, did God make a mistake?  Of course not. His route is lovingly circuitous, right?  He’s training them…will they listen?

I often ask Dutch & Heidi to do ridiculous things at home, what we call “practice.”  Dutch will be coloring and I’ll say, “go run and touch the front door and come back!” in a cheerful voice.  There’s no purpose to it other than to train him to listen attentively to my voice–which is a wonderful purpose indeed!

So God tells them to turn around, they need practice at carefully obeying the voice of the LORD because they are about to take a HUGE step of faith, right?  Little do they know what they’ll be doing tomorrow!

So they turn back and God tells them exactly where to camp. Not just a general area, they are to camp right by the sea. And not just by the sea, but in a spot that corners them by the sea.  They are to face the sea. To look straight into an impasse. Then what happens?

God brings Pharaoh.  And six-hundred of his chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them.  They all came out.

So, because of carefully listening to the voice of the LORD, the children of Israel are stuck.  Cornered.  Up against the sea with thousands of Pharaoh’s guys coming after them. And the result?

“They feared greatly.” (v.10)

No kidding!  They were scared out of their wits!  They instantly cry out to God and lament, “Is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us out to die in the wilderness?”  No more are they thankful for the miraculous deliverance in the Passover. And understandably. They have been led into a corner and are facing certain death.

But of course we all know what happens. God parts the Red Sea, all the nation of Israel is saved, and all of Pharaoh’s army and chariots are swallowed up in the sea and lost.  In one fell swoop God fights the entire battle for them. And all they had to do was walk.

What’s the point?  Well, for today the lesson for me is simply that God does indeed lead us into corners. He, wanting us to be successful in our faith, leads us into circumstances where the only way out is God. There is nowhere to run, hide, fight.  We’re stuck in a corner against the Red Sea. And that is where He loves to flex His muscles, doing what only the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords can do. Since He created that sea by a simple word, He is able to part it rather effortlessly.

What corner are we facing today?  Is there a circumstance that seems hopeless. A situation where we have no options.  Or our options have run out. Where we throw our hands in the air and say, “I give up!” That’s great.  Look up.

Chances are the waters are just about to part.

Yesterday we talked about Material for Sacrifice, from Leviticus 6. Elisabeth Elliot shares on this same idea, which is essentially the sacredness of the mundane. I grew up hearing her voice, every single day, over the old radio in our living room, as my mom listened to her wisdom from God’s Word.  I can still hear her voice so clearly in my mind.  I pray you are blessed by the words of this remarkable woman.

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Elisabeth Elliot: “You are loved with an everlasting love.” That’s what the Bible says. “And underneath are the everlasting arms.” This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, talking this week about what I call “the trivial round.” The trivial round.

That phrase comes from an old hymn, written back in the 1800’s, by a man named John Keble. “The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask; room to deny ourselves, a road to bring us daily nearer God.”

Do you have a boring job? Do you wish you had something really fulfilling? Well, that’s a question that I hear asked quite often. People say to me, “It must be so exciting to do what you do.”

Well, thirty years ago or so, women began to get restless, didn’t they? They dreamed of having it all. They were told that they could. They could find a fulfilling job. They could get out of the house, where they had been, as they say, barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Now it was going to be cool, smart, beautifully groomed, appreciated, admired and eventually rich, maybe.

I don’t know what the poor men were thinking to let us indulge in such foolish daydreams. They could have told us we were nuts. Fulfillment does not lie in a job. The men have always understood that. It lies in how we do that job.

A village blacksmith had a hard, hot job. In the old days when the village blacksmith was absolutely necessary, they only had horses. They didn’t have cars. And horses can’t go very far without shoes. The village blacksmith was one of the most important people in the town. But it was a hard job. It was a very hot job. The people knew him and they needed him and he accepted his very necessary position in the village.

Things have changed nowadays, drastically. Nobody notices. It’s a trivial round. It’s the same old stuff, and who cares how it is done? Somebody cares. God cares. This week, let’s think what God thinks about our daily round.

I’ll read you the whole hymn by John Keble. I use this often in my morning devotions. “New every morning is the love our waking and uprising prove, through sleep and darkness safely brought; restored to life and power and thought. New mercies each returning day around us hover while we pray. New perils passed, new sins forgiven, new thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven. If on our daily course our mind be set to hallow all we find, new treasures still of countless price God will provide for sacrifice. Old friends, old scenes, will lovelier be as more of heaven in each we see. Some softening gleam of love and prayer shall dawn on every cross and care. The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask; room to deny ourselves, a road to bring us daily nearer God. Only, O Lord, in Thy dear love, fit us for perfect rest above. Help us, this and every day, to live more nearly as we pray.”

Verse 1 speaks of being new every morning. “Our waking and uprising prove that God’s mercy and grace is new every morning.” Do you understand that? How could we possibly wake, let alone put a foot out of bed, if it weren’t for the grace of God? “If on our daily course our mind be set to hallow all we find, new treasures still of countless price God will provide for sacrifice.”

Some of you, my faithful listeners, are working right now as you listen. The man in the carpenter shop. The combine. The UPS driver. The woman in the kitchen, the laundry, the bedroom, the bathroom. Is your mind set to hallow what you find? In other words, to make it holy, to make it an offering to Jesus Christ?

If it is, then you will find treasures-material for sacrifice. The trivial round. Let’s say you’re peeling onions for the soup. How many times have you peeled onions before? Same old onions. Same tears shed. Same necessity of feeding your family. But this is one of the givens of your life.

I love to think about the givens and the not-givens. Many things you long for which have not been given. But this trivial round of three meals a day-how many loads of laundry, how many bathrooms to clean, how many rugs to vacuum-“the trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask.” One of the things that it furnishes is room to deny ourselves-the opportunity day by day for the love of God to give up our right to ourselves, to glorify God in the way that we do the humblest work.

It’s a very difficult thing to get across this message that any work at all, any honest work in the whole wide world, from scrubbing floors to being the CEO of a very lucrative company, it can be offered to Jesus Christ and it can be done in a way that pleases Him as an offering.

So whatever your task may be, it is a given. It is a task ordained, assigned, and offered, if you wish to offer it and if you want to make it an offering to Jesus Christ. And yes, it is something which is required of you.

Do you think of yourself as a slave? Well, I have a lovely word of encouragement for you. It’s fromColossians 3:22-24. The Apostle Paul is writing. He says, “Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything and do it not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord.” Remember, he is writing to people who do the worst kinds of jobs, the lowest, most unwanted jobs in the world. But he says it can be an act of reverence for the Lord.

Verse 23 says, “Whatever you do, work at it with all of your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.”

I know a man who has two jobs. He works full-time for a professional house cleaning company, cleaning other people’s houses. He also works in the house where he lives and helps by doing some of the cleaning there. Neither job is one that he really wants. It’s just that those happen to be the only jobs that he has been able to get so far. He has all sorts of high fallutin’ ideas of wonderful things that he would like to do sometime.

I have had several conversations with this young man, attempting to show him that, for one thing, we really don’t know whether we’ve got tomorrow, let alone next week or next year to do something wonderful. All we have is the work that God has given us today. If we could take seriously Paul’s words to slaves here, I think it would transform the whole attitude toward that menial labor of housework.

Paul says, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward.” In other words, the Lord is going to reward you not by the dignity of the office or the dignity of the job that He has assigned you, but by the faithfulness and humility with which that job is carried out. It is the Lord Christ that you are serving, whether you’re down on your hands and knees scrubbing cupboards or the backs of closets, or whether you’re seated in a very comfortable air-conditioned office as the CEO.

Are you prepared to offer whatever you do to the Lord Jesus Christ? The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask; room to deny ourselves, a road to bring us daily nearer God.”

*from backtothebible.org