Walking around the lake this morning I began to read a new book In the Midst of Chaos: Caring for Children as Spiritual Practice by Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore (Jossey-Bass, 2007).  Bonnie’s comments as a mother and professor at Vanderbilt animate reality as she invests her experience encouraging “integration of faith into daily life” (p. 7). 

“Sanctifying the ordinary” is the title for chapter two.  I cheered her comments that too often we ballyhoo the great Christian thinkers who withdrew alone to monasteries to do their thinking and writing.  Her question “what about the rest of us who invest in the daily life of family?” motivates her belief that her vocation as parent informs everything else.

The ordinary is infused with the extraordinary.  Ordinary is extraordinary.  We live in God’s world.   Thinking that “spiritual life” is somehow divested from the rest of life, we miss God’s view of His world.  Joseph understood this.  After drawing out his brothers’ guilt for their past offense (Gen 44:18-34) he makes the generous statement,

“Now do not be grieved or angry with yourselves, because you sold me

here; for God sent me before you to preserve life…God sent me before

you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth…it was not you who sent

me here, but God…” (Genesis 45:5-8).

Ordinarily, does one person matter in this life?  Ordinarily, does one event make a difference in the flow of history?  Ordinarily, does place or time or change or relationship have a bearing on anything?  Yes.  Yes.  Yes. 

The extraordinary is all around us.  It is woven in the fabric of all of life.  What we do, who we are, where we live, how we work is infused with the imprint of The Triune Personal Eternal Creator.[1] “Why does God have to be brought into everything?” the question is raised.  The answer is simple: He doesn’t, He’s already there.  From sub-atomic particles to expansive galaxies, God created it all.  From Hammurabi’s law code to the American Constitution, God’s influence affects the minds of men.  From the death of the first grader’s fish to the genocide in Sudan, God’s care remains. 

Biblical synthesis is the extraordinary fused with the ordinary.  What was once routine is transformed into a project of grace.  The insignificant becomes significant through heavenly perspective.  The usual, the normal, the regular, the customary, the scheduled must be revisited by special revelation through the eyes of believers. 

[1]Three persons in one essence explain how all of life is interrelated.  Everything in life has meaning because of God’s simultaneous multiplicity and unity.  Christians understand the interconnectedness of everything because they worship The One in Three. Understanding the diversity of life bonded by The Trinity’s work in life.