God in the Mundane…
So I decided to drive to another city a few days ago, but I didn’t ask God nor listened for an answer. Does God really want us to bother him with such mundane stuff, as driving to another city to shop?
The Lord directs the steps of the godly.
He delights in every detail of their lives. (Psalm 37:23, NLT, emphasis added)
I just finished reading Walking with God by John Eldredge—a book in which he argues for the very things that we might think are too mundane to bother God with.
Maybe it’s a way of engaging the heart of God on a daily basis…
Categories: Anecdotes
Eldredge, John Eldredge, NLT, Walking with God
Well, thinking God doesn’t care about the mundane, I think, says more about us than about God, but then agian, he did give us a brain… or what some call sanctified common sense.
Yes, He does. I think “mundane stuff” is often mundane because it’s not directed by the Holy Spirit. I know I’m guilty of this myself. It’s a great question to ask, and I’m glad you asked it because it forces us to answer.
It is a relationship, fulfilling the social and divine needs we are implanted with. We are not praying for his sake, but for ours, whether the subject is mundane or profound.
Brian, Is sanctified common sense another way of referring to the prompting of the Spirit?
PeterM, I’m trying to pay more attention these days to the “mundane stuff.” I think it’s a great way of seeking solitude, silence, and surrender.
Vlad, great perspective. I believe the nature of our relationship with the Father makes a world of diffference.
I find that one of the disadvantages of focusing so intently on the supernatural, is that many forget that God works, far more often, through the mundane. Our paths are only rarely shaped by burning bushes and world-changing floods, and more often shaped by pebbles on the path, thorns on the grass, and words from a stranger.
A Christians’ responsibility, therefore, is to be those pebbles, thorns, and strangers in the lives of others. I wrote about this a few months ago, similarly titled Christ in the Mundane (sorry to plug myself, but you might be interested). The mundane are the things that God is most concerned with, because He’s concerned with us, people who are, mostly, mundane, and live mundane lives filled with mundane things.
Thanks for this word, Damian. It wasn’t mundane at all. Yeah, I’m beginning to get it.
I think a lot of us are deist and don’t really know it.
I wouldn’t call myself deist, T.C. But I think there are as many problems with limiting God to operation through special revelation, or through supernatural means, or through random occurrences or natural systems. If you had to call me something it would be a fide-de-monotheist
. God operates through all possible avenues. Why limit him to one?
Damian, I’m not saying that you’re a deist at all. It is just that we are like practical deists at time when we think God is not involved in certain aspects of our lives.
Yes, I don’t think we can limit an active God.