The Holy Mundane

 

What is worse than waiting?

Having to deal with the trivial and mundane things of life while you wait.

When we’re waiting for something we become focused on it. We want to contribute to the process of its fruition. We want to be part of the progress.

But that’s not always how life works. Most times we have to deal with the mundane things of life while we hope for the future.

As we wait for that new position to open up, we have to continue working in our present job. As we pray for resolution of a problem we have to attend to daily tasks. While we wait for change in the future we continue to deal with the now; all the things that have to be taken care of today.

Theres a lesson in the story of Noah that if we’re not careful we’ll miss. Yes, it is absolutely a story of obedience and trust. It’s an example of moving forward when we don’t know what is in the steps ahead to come. About taking directions when we don’t understand the entire task at hand.

I’m sure there was uncertainty while Noah put that ark together. But there was also progress. He was working towards something. He may not have completely understood what that something was, but in trusting God, he was building something for the future.

“Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it with pitch inside and outside. This is how you are to make it…”-Genesis 14

Noah was part of something extraordinary!

Isn’t it wonderful when God gives us distinct direction that we can follow? Life feels so certain even in the uncertainty.  We may not know what we’re moving towards, but we’re moving none the less!

God then directs Noah to fill the ark with animals of all kinds! How exciting!

But then comes the time of waiting…

The ark was done. His family and all the animals were in place on the ark. The task of building and filling was complete!

God said “Enter the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you alone are righteous before Me in the generation.”-Genesis 7:1

I’m not sure we often think of what Noah was doing during those 40 days of waiting, but I think there lies an important lesson in this understanding.

With an ark filled to the brim with living creature there was work that needed to be done. Children to attend to, animals to feed. Stables to muck out……

Noah wasn’t partaking in anything extraordinary any more. He was no longer building an unprecedented vessel for God. He was no longer working towards something big. He was doing every day, necessary things. There was nothing extraordinary about attending to the issues of his children, feeding animals and mucking out stables.

Or was there?

How many times do we feel we are simply waiting in the mundane of our lives for God to take action; those times when there’s nothing we can do but attend to our daily tasks and wait on the Lord.  

Psalm 27:13-14 says, “I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.”

As we muck out the stables of our lives, while waiting on The Lord, we can tend to feel frustrated and stagnant. Those waiting patterns of our life, make all the mundane things seem all the more meaningless.

Yet, Noah was still waiting on the Lord. All of those mundane tasks  probably felt the farthest thing from Holy! To go from hearing Gods specific directions, and working in the light of day to complete a monumental task….. to being held up in a cramped (most likely smelly) vessel  for 40 days……. may have had an anticlimactic appeal.

But here’s the lesson. It’s all Holy.

The times of moving forward in direction AND the waiting.

In the listening, obeying and building…..AND the attending, cleaning and mucking.

You might be in a time of mucking right now. A time of cleaning out some things in your life or just attending to your everyday tasks, wondering where God is.

He’s doing a new thing.

He’s outside of the ark of your life orchestrating a plan for the future. 

In your moments of ordinary, He is always doing the extraordinary.

So in your times of waiting and frustration, remember Noah. Remember that Holiness often times does not live in the extraordinary but in the ordinary moments of life. What makes them Holy? God’s truth and our trust in it.

“'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future. '” — Jeremiah 29:11

-Pastor Patti