From Ordinary To Sublime

May 20

Don't wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great. Orison Swett Marden

Barring some extraordinary event of ill or of good, today will be an 'ordinary' day. We sometimes lament the sameness of the days that unfold into the weeks and months and years of our lives, but if the truth be told, that sameness is the haven in which we take our refuge from the challenging events that occasionally intrude themselves into the calm ordinary-ness of our day-to-day responsibilities. If we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that we are glad the days unfold with sameness, for that sameness is our comfort zone.

Because our 'today' will be quite similar to our 'yesterday,' we will be afforded a great luxury within it. Because it will need little beyond the time and energy and thought we invested yesterday, we will have the great opportunity to work something extraordinarily lovely for today. Because we won't be required to manage some monumental event or to solve an extremely perplexing challenge, we will have the time to mold and shape this ordinary day into something lovely for those who are important to us.

It will be those lovely things that we do or say or enjoy in the company of our precious ones that will enrich their lives and our own. We will share with them of the good things of Philippians 4:8, “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”

I pray the Lord gives you eyes to see the opportunities He grants to you in which you may invest the truth, the joy, the faith, the love within you into your ordinary moments in order that you may experience within them the wonder and delight of common things that overflow with extraordinary delight. I pray the Lord gives you such confidence in the love Jesus has for you that you will be able to see His hand of blessing extended toward you in every circumstance you face today so the challenges will seem mere potholes to be averted with a slight change of direction, and the blessings will be great havens of joy in the Lord your strength (Nehemiah 8:10).

I pray you see Jesus as the One who carries your real burdens so they cannot weigh you down and as the One who lifts the ordinary baggage of your journey as you traverse through every moment of all your tomorrows with your hand in His (I Peter 5:7). I pray He gives you the joy that enables you to smile, to laugh, to rejoice in every situation for you know His Word is true, that indeed, "All things work together for good to those who love the Lord, to those who are called according to His purpose," Romans 8:28.

In that knowledge may you see the ordinary transformed to lavish blessings—today, tomorrow and forever--even until the trumpet sounds and Jesus splits the eastern sky as we are told in Acts 1:11, "...this same Jesus who is taken up into heaven, will come again in like manner as you have seen Him go." Oh, how that ordinary day will be extraordinarily transformed!