Seemingly Unimportant Tasks

The other day I read a story from Elisabeth Elliot about a Sunday she remembered when she was a little girl. Her father, who was a pastor, had already left for church early and her mother had the task of getting six children ready for church. She then lists a number of things that were going wrong, but how in the midst of it all, her mother was ready, calm and got them all put together and to church on time. Her point in sharing this story was how on Sunday mornings or ordinary days, when we are trying to complete “ordinary or necessary” tasks, it can seem very unspiritual and unrelated to God. But she writes that is not the case!

“But everything in this scene (the Elliot’s getting ready for church) is the King's Business, which He looks on in loving sympathy and understanding, for, as Baron Von Hugel said, "The chain of cause and effect which makes up human life, is bisected at every point by a vertical line relating us and all we do to God." This is what He has given us to do, this task here on this earth, not the task we aspired to do, but this one. The absurdities involved cut us down to size. The great discrepancy between what we envisioned and what we've got force us to be real. And God is our great Reality, more real than the realest of earthly conditions, an unchanging Reality. It is His providence that has put us where we are. It's where we belong. It is for us to receive it--all of it--humbly, quietly, thankfully.

Sunday morning, the Lord's Day, can be the very time when everything seems so utterly unrelated to the world of the spirit that it is simply ridiculous. Yet to the Lord's lovers it is only a seeming. Everything is an affair of the spirit. Everything, to one who loves God and longs with a sometimes desperate longing for a draught of Living Water, a single touch of His hand, a quiet word--everything, I say, can be seen in His perspective.

Does He watch? Yes, "Thou God seest me" (Genesis 16:3). Is His love surrounding us? "I have loved thee with an everlasting love" (Jeremiah 31:3). "I will never leave thee or forsake thee" (Hebrews 13:5). May I offer to Him my feeling of the dislocation between reality and my ideals, that great chasm which separates the person I long to be, the work I long to do for Him, the family I struggle to perfect for His glory--from the actuality? I may indeed, for it is God Himself who stirs my heart to desire, and He can easily see across the chasm. He enfolds all of it, He is at work in me and in those I pray for, "to will and to do of his good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13). I may take heart, send up an instant look of gratitude, and--well, get that beloved flock into the van and head down the freeway singing! Sir Thomas Browne wrote, "Man is incurably amphibious; he belongs to two worlds--to two sets of duties, needs, and satisfactions--to the Visible or This World, and to the Invisible or Other World".

I confess that I have often battled with conflicting feelings over reality and my ideals. I have desires I have of the person I long to be or things I long to do, while still having to hash out the daily duties I am called to. But it was so encouraging to read that God is desirous for us to bring those thoughts, feelings and struggles to Him, for He is the one who has stirred those things in us in the first place. Whatever desires God may fulfill and call us to in the future, the truth of the matter is that we aren’t doing anyone any good if we’re trying to live in that “future”. Today is what we have been called to. Everything, even the most boring, menial task is an affair of the spirit. I pray that I will follow the example of Elisabeth Elliot’s mother and accomplish today’s duties with gratitude and joy. Whether we realize it or not, God is fulfilling His sovereign future plans for us at every step and turn….I just have to make sure I’m being faithful with present plans He has called me to.