In a culture that offers self-idolatry as normal: “believe in yourself and you can do anything” nonsense, ordinary is almost a curse. With Disney sentimental platitudes of potential, celebrity deification, and vicarious ‘reality’ shows—ordinary is just so blah.

And yet almost everyone will be ordinary. Even ordinary Christians—and that is, I think, where the real power of Christianity lurks and lies. In the millions of millions of us ordinary Christians who understand Christianity must be lived in simple ways every day:

James 1:26–27 (ESV)
"If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world."

We do need holy men and women to be big and public in holiness—but for most we will never get on that radar—just going about our business as assigned in Matthew 25 and 28, putting our confession of faith passed down to us into action, as best we can.

Ross Douthat writes in ‘Bad Religion’, that a Christian renaissance will come through a “faith…lived out Christian by Christian, congregation by congregation, day by day, without regard to whether it succeeds in changing the American way of religion as a whole” (p 284). In other words—the mustard seed and very, very ordinary.

The “extraordinary Christian” trend is rather myopic and juvenile. The very nature of ‘Missional’ and ‘Radical’ tends to ghettoize the vast majority of Christians as flawed and compromised and ineffective in God’s great plan. It also betrays a “Do Big things for God” mentality rather than recognition that God does it all, always—He will make a Name for Himself. He may choose to take a few from the pasture, he may choose to make a few great names amongst us, He may design to make a ‘house’ out of a few Christians for His Purpose—(2 Samuel 7:8-11), but whether great or small, ordinary or supermen:

2 Samuel 7:21 (ESV)
"Because of Your promise, and according to Your own heart, You have brought about all this greatness, to make your servant know it."

The current ‘BE Radical’ trend is an expression of youthful potential, as youth believe, for a moment, they can be anything, do anything, and do it all better than those who came before--as all the opportunities of life are open before them. But as they leave their youth behind, they begin to realize they will never parachute, they will never read all the plays of Shakespeare like they thought, and they will never command the military might of the world to defeat the alien invaders from outer space. Time passes and maturity comes—and ordinary is all we can manage. But that is okay.

Embrace the weakness of ordinary. Is it not the place of dependence on God and abiding In God? Strength lives there by God’s grace.

© Kevin Mahon
http://www.beforecaesar.blogspot.com