Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Colossians 2:3-4
I teethed on the pews, so I know my life is hidden with Christ. But it feels “hidden” by hidden disabilities, too. It takes so much time and effort just to walk out some days, there is little to no time left over to do “significant” things I had aspired to, after college, like, oh let’s just say, having some sort of eternal impact for Christ on my generation! I’m tucked away, sometimes just surviving. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t need a public life (please no), but the core of me needs to matter. If I don’t matter, somehow, somewhere, in the scheme of things. I might as well give up.
Show me the wonders of Your great love.. Keep me as the apple of Your eye; hide me in the shadow of Your wings….” Ps 17:7-9
So far (and I’ll let you know if this changes) there are no paycheck raises or crystal plaques handed out for sticking this out. Contrary to what you may think they do not hand out certificates for having the most psychiatrist visits in one marriage. We have multiple decorative crystal monuments on our shelves from my husband’s many inventions. I don’t have any. I am OK with that. But only because I do believe I am significant to Jesus. I am doing what He assigned me. I get to see “wonders of His great love”! I have felt a shadow over my life, but now I realize it’s probably only the loving “shadow of His wings”! If my whole life is hidden from view, serving in this home, unseen, unheard, behind a hidden disability, I am still confident I live, as my mama often quoted, “Soli Deo” For God alone, in full view of His sight before Whom all things are laid bare. I have to matter to someone, and I do.
Lisa Beamer lost her husband on Flight 93, 10 years ago. Her words this year, to college graduates, resonate with me. “I was plucked from obscurity to become a temporary public figure, but my life returned to ordinary years ago….” She called on those graduates to “be unusual in the value we place on each and every soul that He’s created….” (I’m thinking of my loved ones with hidden disabilities.) ”When you realize that today is kind of similar to yesterday and a bit like tomorrow, ask yourself who is becoming whole again on your watch, what is being healed through your influence, how is God redeeming His creation through your life? Your good answers are surely the mark of significance, even in an ordinary life.”
You know when you look at someone with sunglasses on, you see yourself in their lenses? This morning I saw myself reflected in His eyes. He is looking at me. I matter to Him. So do you. “He who touches you, touches the apple of His eye.” Zechariah 2:8
Significantly ordinary,
Joan
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