By Michelle Welch
In Steven Furtick’s book, Sun Stand Still, he says “I like to think God conceals His extraordinary intentions in ordinary people to protect the extraordinary value of His purpose in our lives.” This statement spoke volumes to me. I, like most people, think I am a pretty ordinary person. Living an ordinary life. Wishing I could do extraordinary things. Don’t you? Come on! You can admit it. You want to be different. You want to make a difference. You want to have an extraordinary moment at least once in your life.
Strictly speaking, I spent most of the first half of my life missing out on joy and gladness. I certainly am not saying there were no happy moments. It’s just that without God in my life, I was sort of stumbling around trying to get it right. And trying to get it right leads to a lot of stumbling. I was raised to believe that guilt was something that needed to be carried forever. So between the stumbling and the weight of the guilt, I was barely crawling towards happiness.
When we don’t know God, it is hard to have a purpose that makes us feel like we are accomplishing anything. I reached for the success of the world. I reached for the praise of the world. I searched all over for happiness. I searched in education, in marriage, in friends, in jobs, in travel, in all manner of worldly things. And I can assure you that I remained as ordinary as the next person. Without God in my life, I couldn’t find happiness anywhere. Oh, I had some giddy moments here and there. Several times I had some downright hysterical moments. But happiness…not so much.
After I met God, I began to see that He intended to do extraordinary things through my ordinary life. And now I am waking up to a new day. A day which the Lord made. A day that I can begin to rejoice. More than anything in the world, I can be happy. Everything that has happened in the first half of my life has been to prepare me for these days. I am not sad nor am I wallowing in the guilt of the mistakes I made during the first part of my life. I intend to take all that I have learned and do extraordinary things for the Lord.
Take heart if you are still feeling ordinary. In God’s world there is no such thing as ordinary. God intends to use each of His children for His most extraordinary intentions. We don’t know when. We may not know how. But in the most subtle of shifts, suddenly we will each find our place in God’s world. Read. Study. Pray. Do. Then, when we least expect it, He will move us into a place of extraordinary moments that will show us what real happiness means.
Dearest Father God, oh how we find ourselves seeking the ordinary when we should be doing the extraordinary. You have given us Your Word to guide us and yet sometimes we fail to see even the simplest of instructions. Please show us every day how we can go out into the world and do extraordinary things for You. From our homes, our jobs, our everyday lives, please take us and make us Yours in every way. Let us find Your purpose in all that we do. We pray for the wisdom to become more than ordinary. In the Name of Christ Jesus, Amen.
Psalm 118:24 (NIV) “This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”
Copyright © 2013, Michelle Welch, all rights reserved, Photography by Michelle Welch, all rights reserved, Breath of Life Women’s Ministries.
Scripture from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. Copyright © 1973, 1978,1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide. Used by permission.
