Les Henson
We live at a time when so many people are seeking their fifteen minutes of fame. Everyone, or so it seems, wants to be extraordinary and very few are content with being ordinary. This desire is one of the curses of the time in which we live. All this is bad enough, but when it penetrates deep into the lives of Christian people and begins to distort their hopes and aspirations, then we are in trouble. What’s wrong with being ordinary? The reality is that most of us are ordinary, and there is nothing wrong with being so. When we read the Scriptures, we discover that most people that God uses are simply ordinary. Ordinary people through whom God does extraordinary things, and when God uses us in such a way we need to be careful that we don’t kid ourselves into thinking that we are anything other than ordinary.
In Acts 4:13, when Peter and John are before the council we read that, “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realised that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.” Paul also shows the reality of our true status when in 1 Corinthians 1: 26-30, he writes, “Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.” Later towards the latter part of his life Paul writes to believers in Rome warning them (Rom. 12:3), “Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.” So let us not get caught up in the trap of seeking fame or status but rather let us be content with being ordinary while, at the same time, being open to the extraordinary workings of God in our lives.