Friday, April 22, 2011

Little People, Little Things

Sometimes I think we Christians get caught up in the image and accomplishments of "heroes". To be sure, some amazing things have been, and will be, done. But have we thought about who some of those people were and whether they thought at the time that what they were doing was remarkable? Consider Jesus's disciples. Four were professional fishermen - nothing wrong with that, but one doesn't ordinarily think of such folk as world-changers. Another was (eek!) an IRS agent; a third was a political would-be revolutionary. These were"ordinary" people. Consider the believer, Ananias, who delivered Jesus's call to ministry to Paul. He was not a high church official, not a pastor, wasn't even identified as having any particular ministry. Ananias is simply identified as "a certain disciple".

Little things ... one never knows how and by what means one affects others' lives. A cousin "kidnapped" me to a Young Life meeting when I was a junior in high school. While I had been raised in a church - a good one, honestly - I was still trying to run my own life. I wasn't faring, at that point, too well and academics aside, I don't know how well I would have done in college. That night changed my life. Nothing spectacular about the meeting, but that night I gave Jesus control of my life and haven't regretted it or looked back. I doubt my cousin ever knew how her "little" act affected me (I lost track of her when she graduated that year, and after I graduated from high school I moved 800-900 miles away for college).

We Christians don't need to strive to copy one of our Christian "heroes". Every one of us is unique! But if we are content to be "simple" "certain disciples" faithfully doing the "simple" things God gives us to do God can use those "simple" things to have great consequences into eternity.

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