Ordinary Glory

I won't have a specific passage for you to turn to. I have a couple that I'll read to you. I have quite a few I'll read to you, and they're in your notes if you want to be there and turn to those. I've talked before jokingly, but though it's a joke, it's not a joke. It's true that nobody writes books about janitors or plumbers or parents. Now, there's a lot of books on parenting, but you don't hear a lot of books on any parents like, you know, this parent did a fantastic job. They wrote a book on that parent. Even further, there are simple things, like things that you might think of as all that special, you might not think of as all that special, that are called extraordinary. You know what that phrase means, right? Extraordinary. It's right in the word, by the way. It's ordinary but extra. We use that word a lot, the word extra. We use it for things like extracurricular. When curricular is not enough? When extra strength, when strong is not enough? We use that word extra a lot. But it is a weird thing to put extra on the front of ordinary because it might sound, and I actually do think it does mean, you are no longer ordinary if you are extraordinary. You're just extra. You're different. So what is it about ordinary ordinary about basic things like being a janitor or plumber? Ordinary things. What is it about ordinary that is so distasteful to us? Why do we not watch movies about ordinary things? Why do we not watch— I mean, we'll watch a cooking channel, but you don't ever watch somebody just making, you know, a baked potato unless it's a deconstructed baked potato with a chocolate glaze and blah blah blah and makes it extraordinary. I think there's something going on, and I think we have fallen for something in our world that ordinary is not enough.

And it's my goal here today not to tell you to be extraordinary, but to maybe help you see that there is a way and should be a mentality where you recognize that ordinary can glorify God. And our problem, I think, is that we think only extraordinary glorifies God. We might miss the opportunities. I've had lots of conversations with people, especially men, because it's usually young men that I'm in conversation with, where they have this compulsion to want to do something meaningful for the Lord. That's a good, noble compulsion. That's a good thing. If your heart is telling you you want to do something for the Lord and do something of meaning and purpose with your life, I'm glad you have that inclination. And then there's also usually associated with that the idea that my normal day-to-day activity is not doing that, is not glorifying the Lord. So there's this pressure that I'm going to work, my boss isn't nice to me, I'm underpaid, I'm tired all the time, and I feel like I'm wasting my life or my life is being spent in those pursuits, but I want to glorify the Lord.

And so I think what happens is we think that that day-to-day stuff, those day-to-day activities, the day-to-day ordinary things are not glorifying things while significant things are. Like big things. Like people write books about missionaries, not about janitors. They write books about pastors, not about plumbers or housewives. And so I think we have it in our mind and we've kind of fallen for this and our culture feeds it like crazy. With social media, with fame, with movies, with entertainment, with music. I mean, they're called rock stars, right? They are stars and we're dirty old planets or whatever we are. And so we exalt the extraordinary and then we think down on the ordinary.

I talk a lot about glory. It's sort of been the theme of my ministry. But I promise you, I don't talk enough about glory. If I do my job today and we get through this time together, you will leave here knowing not that you should be ordinary and stay that way or never pursue anything extraordinary. That's not the goal. The goal is not to say extraordinary is bad. The goal is to make sure you understand that God probably designed those things you're doing that are called ordinary so that you would do them for his glory. Instead of us thinking that that day-to-day thing, like taking care of our family, is ordinary, but doing ministry is extraordinary, we recognize that everybody has their thing to do to glorify God, and the ordinary things bring him honor and glory.

It's been now 22 years since I entered the ministry. 10 years of those were an assistant pastor. 12 years of that was senior pastor. And on my statement that I presented to the church at that time in 2004, I had a statement that essentially is a definition of what I felt I was called to be as a pastor. And in that statement, I put that I believe everything could and should be done to the glory of God. And one of the things I put in there was even a mother changing her diapers can be done to the glory of God. And there's a person, I don't think he's living anymore, but I'm I haven't talked to them in decades, so I don't know where they're at. But a person kind of cornered me. It was out actually on your lawn out there where they cornered me. And they whispered in my ear quietly because they didn't want to be disrespectful out loud. They said, you shouldn't have said that thing in your statement about babies' diapers. You shouldn't have said that. And they thought I was doing it for effect, like I was just saying it to make a point, right? And they thought that— that I should have been more reverential maybe in my statement or whatever. And I told them, I said what I believed is the truth in my statement. And I was not saying it to be clever or for effect.

And the irony of me saying that right now on this date in 2026 is hilarious. The providence of that. Because some of you know that my grandbaby has tummy issues. And if you didn't know, The new baby, Silas, had tummy issues too. So we're, as a church right now, praying for diapers to be full in this case so that the babies would be— would feel better and get better. And I think it's no small irony that the Lord allowed me to see that on the day I'm reminded that you can change diapers to the glory of God and that my family celebrates when there's a full one because it means her tummy's feeling better. We literally have cried over it and we've praised God over it. Now you say, what a crazy thing to do, to praise God over something as silly and low as a dirty diaper. I feel bad for you if you think that. I feel bad for you if you think that you've got to be a missionary and change the world to glorify God. I would love for you this week to eat ice cream for the glory of God. I want for you men to go to work tomorrow morning, and when that clock wakes you up in the morning, instead of saying, "Ah, another day, another dollar," you say, "Another day, another glory." That's what I want. We'll see if the Scripture is saying that to us this morning. Let's pray.

Father, it's very clear you created the heavens and the earth. You are the Creator. And some of those things you create might seem ordinary to us. Things like dirt, things like flowers, but you created them and called them good. And then you told your people to use those things and to manage those things and to be fruitful for your honor. And I'd ask, Father, that today, of course, Father, we want to acknowledge and respect and celebrate people who do ministry, who do what we think of as upfront ministry— people who sing, people who preach, missionaries who go into the field and evangelists who preach. We absolutely want to honor people who go into the ministry. But, oh Father, I would ask that we would leave here today understanding that worshiping you is not something that is only 1 hour a week on Sundays. That's something we can do with our whole lives, something we can do tomorrow at work, with our families, with our grandchildren. We could do it as students. The young people in this room can glorify you by getting good grades. These are things that we can all do and make you central as an act of service and worship.

We'd ask, Father, that when the word challenges us on this subject, that we would all leave here committed to day-to-day glorifying. And Father, also, if we are challenged to do more ministry, that we would accept that challenge as well, that it wouldn't be to put ministry aside, it would be to do more ordinary things in ministry. Help us, please, so that we will glorify you. In Jesus' name, amen.

Yeah, it might seem like a contradiction in terms to call it ordinary glory, like it might be a contradiction in terms to say extraordinary. But it's not. We'll dig in right now. The first thing we're going to do is define our terms. It's always good to sort of frame your subject matter, to define your terms up front, to know what we're discussing. And the first thing we're going to discuss— and I have to go fast. We have so much to cover with communion to follow. So I'm going to go real fast. I mean, as fast as I can with any sort of making sense of it all. And so I'm going to read a lot of passages. I'm going to— I don't want you to think— hopefully you know me by now that I wouldn't cheat and brush over passages of Scripture. I'm going to give parts of passages this morning just for speed, but all the references are in your notes if you want to go home and read those with some depth and context. But we're going to go fast, and then there will be a couple of points while we're moving fast where I pump the brakes and we camp a little bit on an area or a subject and then move fast again.

So if you just buckle up. We're going to go fast. And I want you to be ready for that because it's going to feel like I'm moving past things. But it's mainly because there are high and low points of things I want to emphasize. So the first thing, this section, the definition of things is going to go kind of fast. And the first thing you need to know is that ordinary is not a special word. You don't need a dictionary. It's actually in the word itself. Or-der. Ordinary. Ordained. That beginning of that word means the same in all those things. They're all related to each other. The psalmist David says, "When he considers the moon and the stars which you have ordained," ordered, right? Put in their place. Peter talks about submitting to every ordinance of man. An ordinance is something that's ordained. An ordinance is ordinary. Got it? These are basic things. These are things that are ordered. That's the meaning of the word. Whoever resists the authority of God resists The orderness of God, the ordinance of God, the ordinary. Let all things be done decently and in order. Ordinary just means order. It is the adjective you use to describe things in order.

So I'm going to ask you a simple question. Are things being in order bad? Have a good day. Do you want to close in prayer? Is your home being in order bad? Is your home being functional bad? Is your marriage in order bad? Is your life in order bad? No. Order and ordained mean the same thing. In their proper place. In order. So before you think ordinary is bad, let me just tell you, if you thought that, you were lied to. Because God does everything in order. God's things are ordinary. The extraordinary part of God's things is God, not the thing. So out of the gate, ordinary is ordered. Order is good, chaos is bad. Got it? So out of the gate, we already know that something that's ordinary is not bad, it's good. And if it's good because God put it in order, it glorifies him.

The next thing is what glory is. So order, ordinary, don't think of ordinary as a bad word anymore. You can't think of that anymore. We used to have a saying in the business we all used to be in, me and Serge and other people, that you call me anything but average and ordinary. And just the thought of being ordinary was this curse. And that's wrong. It's wrong to think that. You might say, I want to do something special for the Lord, and that's okay to do that, to want to do lots of things to bring God lots of glory. But don't miss out that some of those things are going to be ordinary things that bring God glory. And you can do them well, and you can do them with excellence, and you can pursue them with energy and vigor, and you should do that. But don't think of the things themselves, the actions themselves. We'll look at those today. Actions, attitudes, things that can glorify God that we might not realize do glorify God. That's the goal today is to get that in the front of your mind that you can eat food to the glory of God. You can mow your lawn to the glory of God.

The word glory means value, the main meaning. There's a couple of other kinds of glory in the Bible, like the shininess of God, the refulgence of God, like the— you say Shekinah, but that word's not actually in the Bible. So the appearance of God being glorious and that kind of thing. But the main understanding of the word glory is the word weight, like heaviness or value. So when you think of like, I put my item I want to buy on this side of the scale and we got to figure out how much it weighs. To know how much to charge for it. That thing you put on the other side that values it, that weight is the glory of that thing. So think of glory as price tag. That's the main meaning of it. So when the Bible says, "Whatever you do, do to the glory of God," "All things are for the sakes of the Corinthians that they might cause thanksgiving and abound to the glory of God," when the Bible says, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," all of that is with reference to the value of God.

So when you eat to the glory of God in 1 Corinthians, it has to do with religious food like communion, right? It has to do with things that you would say, well, I'm not going to eat meat sacrificed to idols, or I am and it's going to be okay. Paul is saying whichever of those you choose, whatever you eat, make sure you're doing it for the glory of God, right? That's the idea is honor God in however you eat, religious or otherwise. And when he says that things are to abound to the glory of God, it's saying that everything is supposed to show to you in your life that God is most valuable.

That's what glory means. When you praise God, when you praise God, you are appraising God. You are appraising him as most valuable. So the glory— when we talk about things being ordinary and having glory, what we are saying this morning, what I am saying this morning, is that ordinary things in order, properly understood, show God's value. And we might have fallen for a lie that it is only the extraordinary or special or specific things that glorify God.

I've heard so many times over the years, which is a ridiculous statement because most of you actually know me, that people think that being a pastor somehow is more glorifying than being a housewife. It's so ridiculous. Like, please stop thinking that. Stop thinking that. Not only does it bother me because it— first of all, I don't feel like I'm all that glorious most of the time, so I don't think you're telling the truth. But also, you're missing out that raising your children in the Lord is the same amount of glory as what I'm doing. They're literally equal glory. If you and I, if you are changing your child's diaper for the glory of God, you're giving God 100% glory, right? Can't give more if it's your baby and you're taking care of that baby for the glory of God. Can't give more than 100%. And if I'm preaching, hopefully, from my heart to the glory of God, I'm giving God 100% of glory too. So neither of us are giving 110. We're giving God all the glory we can. So ordinary is not bad. It's good. And glory is value. And the message this morning is that ordinary things bring God glory. Things that we might have made the mistake of seeing as insignificant because they don't look like the big things and the special things and the flashy things and the lights and the shiny.

I want you to see that things that we think— remember David's brothers all seemed like good soldiers and little insignificant shepherd David seemed like he wasn't the significant one? Which one of those guys brought Him glory? It happens over and over again. We want a king like the rest. People are like, "Ah, we're insignificant. We don't have kings like the rest of the nations out there." How did that work out for Israel when they wanted significance? So don't fall for it. Don't fall for thinking that signs and significance are the things that bring God the most glory. It's a subtle little trick to think that earthly things like that passage here— now, Ecclesiastes, by the way, I challenge you to read through the whole book of Ecclesiastes if you haven't in a while. What a beautiful snapshot of the world you live in. It will tell you, it will make so much sense of what you're seeing in our world today. But anyway, a couple of verses from Ecclesiastes where Solomon says, "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is man's—" Who knows how that sentence ends? Fear God and keep His commands, for this is man's— All. Fear God, keep His commandments. That's all man needs to do. It doesn't say fear God, keep His commandments, and change the world. Make a difference. Make an impact. Don't just be a normal person, an average and ordinary person. No, it says fear God and keep His commandments. That's all man needs to do. That's the very ordinary thing to do.

Philippians, Paul will say that the unbelievers' god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, and they set their mind on earthly things. Now, there's a subtle trick here, because I'm telling you the earthly things can bring God glory. But I'm telling you they can't bring God glory if you're focused on the earthly thing and not the God of the earthly thing. So there's this dilemma you might have, a pendulum, a Sloan's pendulum here that swings from one extreme to the other. The one extreme is, is earth is all there is and that's the place I'm going to be happy and I'm not going to live like there's a tomorrow and I'm going to try to get all I can on earth. And you Christians who feel like maybe your lives are insignificant don't want to fall into that. You don't want to fall into the people who are just worldly and they only care about the world's things. And so you think the answer to that, I don't want to fall into the world's things, I don't want to love what the world loves, I don't want to just do earthly pursuits, I don't like that, I know God doesn't like that, I'm not supposed to put my mind on earthly things. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to become like the Gnostics and swing all the way to the other side of the pendulum and say only super duper uber spiritual things count. Only if I'm praying 19 hours a day and then preaching the gospel to the others that are left. Only if I'm finding some way to preach the word and do missions, and that's the only thing that counts, is if I'm actually in the trenches doing the Great Commission. So these earthly things, no, I don't focus on those. I only focus on heavenly things. But you're missing that God made the earth and everything in it so that it can be used to glorify him. We don't want to become Gnostics that think that matter is evil, that things are bad. They are ordered so they're good. That's family, that's work, that's every time you turn your car engine over.

Like right now, we— I think we need a tensioner pulley in my Camry. So every time we turn the key over, it has a little— just a little squeak, and it reminds me it needs to be replaced. But it also reminds me that every time I turn that key over, my engine starts. So now, before, where I might have been taking that for granted— every time I turn the key, the engine just starts and I don't think about it at all— now it reminds me every time, "Hey, I'm started." And you know what I say? "Do you know how many things have to go right for an engine to run? All of them happened. The fuel mixture, the fuel injection, the computer, everything worked just right." And then I need to say, like you need to say, as ordinary as that might seem to you that your car would just start and run, you should probably be saying, Physics is amazing. God is amazing. The science that got this to me is amazing. So this ordinary thing, starting it, is amazing. It's ordinary, but it's God-glorifying if you see it correctly.

And what I just did with my car and my tensioner pulley, you can do with everything. You can do it with your toaster if you want. Boing! Heated toast. Hallelujah. You could do that if you want. Or you could think that only being a preacher brings God glory. You could think that if you want. But you're going to waste your life if you do that. You're going to waste so many opportunities to bring God glory. And I don't want you to waste those opportunities. Everything is for the glory of God, all of it. And don't fall for the idea that if something isn't significant the way the world tells me there is significance, or even Christianity tells me there's significance, right? Because you don't write books about ushers. As far as I know, there's no book about the best usher who ever lived. Like an usher in a church in China. I never read that book. We always talk about the missionaries to China, right? But we don't talk about the usher in China. Why not? Because it's exciting and extraordinary that somebody would give up their life and go and preach the gospel. But it's also extraordinary that in a persecuted church there's ushers. Seems pretty ordinary, but that's what makes it good.

Now, I'll give you a few actions, attitudes, and then aptitudes, some things that bring God glory. Some of them are obvious, some of them you'll clearly see, like, of course that brings God glory. But some of them I hope would Maybe if there is a switch that needs to be flipped in your life, that there will be a switch flipped in your life. And there are also a couple of challenges. So if you settle into the idea, right, because you might be thinking that what I'm saying is you don't have to change anything today to bring God glory. I am for sure not saying that. Like, I'll just say this to you right now, none of us are sharing the gospel enough. Okay? Sharing the gospel is supposed to be ordinary. It's not supposed to be extraordinary. It's supposed to be our day-to-day lives as we go to make disciples. So we're supposed to be changing, but the change is not to become extraordinary. It's supposed to be that we see the charge to ordinarily share the gospel. So there's going to be some challenges. So I don't want us to settle into some level of contentment where we think, well, I don't have to change anything. All I do need to now is just include hallelujah in my language and everything's fine. Nope. We're supposed to have a kingdom focus for sure. But I think we thought that maybe there were only superheroes that had kingdom focuses, not just us and our families.

So here's a few actions. The first one is to be converted. To be converted. And that might be a foregone conclusion to you, but it's not. Because I actually think that sometimes people think they need to do extraordinary things spiritually to be accepted by God. Right? That I have to give a lot of money into a church or I got to do a lot of I got to help the homeless, or I got to go act really Christian in order to be right with God. But that's not true. The Bible is really clear that the flesh cannot please God. Paul says it so clearly, "In your flesh, you can't please God." And we have other passages like us being predestined. Ephesians, Paul talks about being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of His glory. So the first thing that you can do, the first action you can take to be on the road to glorifying God in your ordinary life is to be saved. Nobody who isn't saved glorifies God except in judgment under God's wrath. So unsaved people cannot glorify God because they're not in Christ. You can only glorify God when you've trusted Christ. That's what Paul is saying there. Only the people who trust Him glorify Him. So this isn't the nicest people or the people who have big giant nonprofits or anything like that. Those things might be extraordinary.

Hey, did you hear that this guy, this famous person— like I just heard one recently that's really impressive. It's the singer of Pearl Jam, the band. He has a pretty big influence on a pretty intense nonprofit. And it's admirable. I stand back and say it's admirable what he's done. It's big. And he's made a really— helped a lot of people. But does that mean he glorifies God because he's extraordinary as a famous person and helps a lot of people in his nonprofit? No. You have to be saved to glorify God in the ordinary or extraordinary things. So that's the first thing is the first action, if you haven't already, is to be saved. So I haven't gotten to the things yet. We're still stressing the things that you can do. And the first thing you can do is that salvation is ultimately for God's glory. And you have to be saved to glorify God.

The second thing you can do, and I actually think this is literally second, It's the next thing that should be happening is instead of getting saved and then say, okay, now I'm saved, church is not important, I'm going to go out there and do my thing and try to be more Christian-y in my life because I got saved now. No, the first thing that you do after you do the first thing, which is get saved, is to begin worship and serving Christ. And this is that part I'm telling you where I am going to try to convince you that being a mom is for the glory of God, but I'm not going to leave out being active in your church is for the glory of God. Being active in ministry is for the glory of God. It's just not only designated or relegated to preachers and teachers and pastors. It's for everybody in the church. But first, Paul talks about in 1 Corinthians, he talks about fleeing sexual immorality and he says, "Don't you know that the Holy Spirit is in you?" And then he says, "You are not your own, for you Christians..." Remember, he's saying Christians. He's not saying pastors. He's not saying missionaries. He's saying, you Christians were bought at a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirits, which are God's. He's saying that to the whole church. It was the church that had a sin problem with sexual immorality. They were allowing it in the church. He's saying purge out that sin. And don't you understand, church, all of you, everybody, the members of the Corinthian church and our church by application, you were bought with a price. Therefore, you all glorify God in your body.

He didn't say you all need to become missionaries. You are already a missionary in your community. As you go, make disciples. You're supposed to be a missionary right now. You're not supposed to stop what you think is ordinary or unimportant or insignificant and go do something ordinary or important or significant. You're supposed to say, I'm already going. That's literally the go of the Great Commission as a participle. As you go, as you are going, make disciples. So he's saying you don't own yourself, you've been bought. And it doesn't say, and only the people in special ministry or full-time ministry Those are the super special people. God paid extra for those people. No, everybody was bought with a price to glorify God in their body. In 2 Corinthians, Paul says that we make it our aim, whether we're with God or absent from him, to be well pleasing to him. And then he says that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. That means everything. That means everything in your life, every choice you make, every verb, every action you commit in your life. Is either good or bad. Now, there are things that are kind of amoral or non-moral, like, I don't know, breathing. Like, if I don't breathe right, is God going to be mad at me? You know, there are things that are less significant. But what he's saying, as far as the reward system and judgment, the idea is God is counting your energy and your attention and the things you're doing and whether they're good or bad. And he's not only counting— he doesn't say there's a class of things called spiritual and eternal, and these are the things that I'm counting, and those will be the things on which I base my judgment of you. No, he's saying everything you do in your life can either be good or bad, whether you eat or drink. That's the same book, same author, I mean. So there is service to the body.

I don't know if you know, but all those you's, I remember seeing that for the first time in Greek in 1 Corinthians, all those Y-O-U's are plural. So you are not your own. That means y'all are not your own. It means everybody, that you as a body of believers, you don't own yourself. Bought you all. So as a body, we're all supposed to be glorifying God as a church and as individual Christians. So inwardly, we love each other and we serve each other and we take care of each other internally, but we also do outreach. So we're supposed to be doing inreach and outreach. And I like to say that our inreach is supposed to be leading to our outreach, which is why it's on my mind to say what I said earlier about the call to worship. So that we should be living our lives that when we're looking out for each other, taking care of babies, taking care of people in need and looking out for each other as a congregation, that what that should be turning into is a healthy, solid congregation that does a ton of outreach, that does a lot of evangelism and sharing the gospel.

The next action that we do that are considered ordinary, I don't know if you think of prayer and being quiet as ordinary, but that's what Paul says. He exhorts that all men, that supplications and prayers and intercessions and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority. Why? That we may lead a quiet and peaceable life. I wonder what Paul would say if he saw modern people with social media. I wonder what Paul would say if he saw Christians shouting in the streets for their rights. I wonder what he would say when we're literally called to pray for our leaders. Why? Because if our leaders are prayed for and they are doing things that we ask them to do, they're doing things that make for a peaceful, orderly, ordinary society, then we can do our thing, which is make disciples, bring people to the Lord, share the gospel freely. So Paul's literally saying, pray for your leaders so that you can have a quiet and peaceable life. Do you know what we say? We're going to have a loud and noisy activist protesting life to change our leaders. Is it exciting to pray? Do you pray really loud and exciting? Do you turn music up really loud at your house? Or does your prayer life kind of seem ordinary, where you bow your head and you do something quiet? Do you want the result to be a big splash of extraordinary attention to Christianity? Or do you want what Paul says we should be praying for, a quiet and peaceable life? Are we praying that we would increase in our volume? Or do we pray with John, I have to decrease so that he can increase? So it is an action on your part to pray and live a quiet, peaceable life. That seems kind of ordinary, doesn't it? To live a quiet and peaceable life sounds kind of boring. It doesn't sound significant. It doesn't sound special. But we live in a selfie-driven culture and a protest and an activist-driven culture that says, make as much noise as you can. They're against you. They're tearing you down. Fight, fight, fight, fight. Instead of preaching the gospel, instead of putting ourselves down and increasing Christ, We put ourselves up. Instead of selfless, we take selfies. Yeah, I wonder what Paul would say about social media. I can imagine if you even said to Paul, hey, most people's social media is full of a thing called a selfie. He'd probably say, you're joking, right? Because self is bad. I wonder what he would say.

And then here's the one. This is the one where I tell you I'm taking the high points, and this is the one where I really, even if I don't spend a lot of time here, I would like a big part of the emphasis to be here, which is hard work and raising your family in the Lord is an ordinary action that brings glory to God. Hard work. Getting up, going to work, paying the bills, cleaning the house, doing the laundry, checking the oil, making the bed. Feeding the kids again and again and again. All can and should be done to the glory of God. If you think those things— many people think those things are getting in the way of glorifying God instead of seeing them correctly as things that do glorify God. Paul makes it so clear in Colossians 3:23. It's why I have it as the theme verse. And whatever you do— what does that mean? When you hear whatever, how many things are you doing? How many of those does whatever apply to? All of them. "Whatever you do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance, for you serve the Lord Christ." Do you know what's in that context that Paul is talking about? What's in that context of Colossians 3? What are the kinds of things? He clearly, he means giving up everything and becoming a pastor or missionary, right? That's what he's talking about. No, he's talking about serving your masters. He's talking about your work life, that you can do your work life heartily to the Lord and not to men. Instead of thinking it's just ordinary because I can go into that place where there are only men, and then I do the spiritual, super spiritual thing where I knock on doors or I preach a sermon, or those are the super spiritual things, those are extraordinary. Wrong. They are both ordinary and both good and should both glorify God. That's what you should be learning. That Pastor Johnny's sermon is you framing a house if you're a carpenter. That the missionary that goes to Africa to share the gospel is you changing a diaper, mom, raising your child in the Lord. They are equal. There isn't a special class.

Now, it is true that there is more sacrifice. There's more emphasis on maybe being prepared to be persecuted for things if you go into ministry. That is true too. But if you want to feel that in your ordinary life, just share the gospel more. You'll get the persecution. You'll get the condemnation. You'll get the ridicule. You'll get everything the missionaries get when they go into the field if you just start sharing the gospel out loud. So if you want the significance of persecution, if you want to take up your cross and feel what it likes to take up a cross, tomorrow share the gospel with your next-door neighbor. You don't need to be a pastor for that. You can feel all the wonderful joys that come with being in full-time ministry just by trying to share the gospel with a friend at work or your family member. You'll get all that wonderful persecution. I always used to say when we'd go knock on doors in the neighborhoods, I'd always say, I just want you to know that most of the stuff you're scared of when we go knock on doors, like the things you're probably worried about happening at the doors, it's all going to happen. Yeah, it's all going to happen. People are going to slam the door in your face. People are going to ignore you. People are going to sneer at you. People are going to say they don't want to hear from you. That's all going to happen. But there's also going to be people, maybe God has worked on their heart, like I got to experience this week. Like God had already cultivated before I got there and they were ready. And they thought I was a super guy for stopping in and helping them. Well, normal things.

I'm going to read a few verses. I'm going to just run through them real quick. And I want you to notice as I read them, I already told you that that Colossians passage is work life, okay? Is work life. There's not a whole lot about full-time ministry. And the epistles of Paul. Almost all of it applies to day-to-day life, normal life, paying the bills, working hard, having the right attitude, honoring the Lord in your day-to-day activity, in your stewardship, in your finances, in your marriage, in your parenting. That's pretty much the epistles, is how to live your life as a Christian, not how to become a full-time extraordinary so-called spiritual person. So as I read these verses, what I want you to key in on, as I— it's almost like I'm asking you I want you to be ready to not ring a physical bell, but I want you to hear in your mind as I read the verses the things that sound very ordinary, okay? And what God says about those, the way God describes those things. These are ordinary things, and I'm telling you, does God speak highly of those ordinary things? Or does He say those are the things that you only do because you have to, but there are these other great things you can do for the kingdom? Or can you bring God glory in those things?

Listen, Proverbs 12:11, he who tills his land will be satisfied with bread, but he who follows frivolity is devoid of understanding. Does that sound like tilling your land is ordinary and shouldn't be considered something that honors God? He literally uses it as a comparative to what people do that are evil, a contrast. Proverbs 20:13, do not love sleep lest you come to poverty. Open your eyes and you will be— huh, strange word you choose here, Solomon. Satisfied with bread. Wait, bread satisfies? No, I need prestige, I need honor, I need impact, I need to know that I've done something very significant in my life. And it pretty much just says wake up and work and God will give you food and you'll be satisfied with the food. And God will be glorified by the food He gave you when you say, "Thank you for the food You gave me and the ability to earn for my family and take care of things."

Paul goes to great length in 1 Timothy 6:15-17. First about pastors, but then I think he means broader, because I think he's saying to Timothy, make sure this is what you hold to and then share it to the church. Because remember that book he says, I'm writing on how you should conduct yourself in the house of God. So he says all those things. He says if anyone teaches otherwise, do not consent, and does not consent to wholesome words, the words of our Lord, he's proud, he doesn't know anything. Those people elevate things like strife and reviling and wranglings, and those people are men of corrupt minds and destitute of truth. And then they suppose something. Listen, he says, "Who suppose that godliness is a means of gain." And he says, "From such withdraw yourself." Now, what's the contrast to that? Instead of trying to seek riches for gain— can I say this to people who are trying to be popular? Hey, young people, can you hear me right now? Followers, getting TikTok engagement, somebody liking your posts, somebody telling you that that's great what you're doing. Instead of trying to gain in the earth, what's the contrast? What does Paul give us as the alternative to that?

He says, "Now godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out." And then he goes to say something blasphemous to our culture. Paul is about to say something blasphemous to modern Americans. He says, "And having food and clothing," 'With these we shall be content.' No, you mean food, clothing, and a certain number of Instagram followers. No, you mean food, clothing, and a really powerful internet presence as a preacher or teacher. No, you mean food, clothing, and a number of churches I've planted as a church planter or missionary. No, he says we are trying to live— he already said it— we're living a quiet and peaceable life on earth. Why? Because we're giving God credit as we pray to our leaders. So that we can have a quiet and peaceable life. And then now that if they fall in line, and we are very blessed in our country that we still get to preach and teach the gospel freely. So we have the freedom to do it. We have the freedom right now. It is not illegal for you right now to share the gospel with strangers. It is allowed by your Constitution. But what do we use our Constitution for? Freedom of speech. Wait, it's also freedom of assembly. It's also freedom of religion. So that you could be sharing that benefit that our Constitution gives us so that people take advantage of the benefit and get to experience the religion called Christianity.

You say, "Pastor, you're speaking out of both sides of your mouth. Which is it? That I can change diapers to the glory of God, or as a normal human being that doesn't have extraordinary— that I don't wear a cape like a superhero— can share the gospel to the glory of God?" Yeah, both. I'm saying both. I'm saying we normal people who are normal workers, who have normal families, who have children, who are changing diapers, we and evangelists and ministers and all those people are doing the same thing. I just happen to do mine here at the church. You're supposed to be doing yours out there as you go. That's the only difference is the location. We're all supposed to be doing the same thing. I should be satisfied with bread. Not necessarily a big following as an earth-changing pastor, right? You should be satisfied with bread, maybe as an electrician or a carpenter or a housewife or whatever, student. Godliness with contentment is great gain. Food and clothing, be content with those. Those who desire to be rich. What does rich mean in our culture? Does rich only mean materialistic and covetous, or does it also mean of great reputation in our culture? People who get the attention of others. People who have huge followings. Please hear me when I say this. This is the lesson. This is the main lesson because I have seen so many people who go to work every day, who wake up every day and take care of their kids, who go to school every day, who see their grandkids every day, who do normal things in life. And they think they are doing those things until later when they do the things that they glorify God on Sunday or in some other ministry work. And I want you to get that out of your mind.

God created— the things God created are normal things that he called good, right? When he created the animals, what did he call them? Good. When he created the planet, what did he call it? Good. When he created light, what did he call it? Good. None of those things are ministry. None of those things were what we— they're anything but what we would call ordinary. When God made the ordinary earth He stood back and said, my ordinary earth, ordered, is good. It brings me honor and glory. And then he puts us in it. And what does he say? What's the first commandment he gives after that wife gets there on earth? Is it go be missionaries to the non-humans that are there right now? No, be fruitful. What is that? What does being fruitful and multiplying mean? It means having a family and raising your family to glorify the Lord. And then how do you make a family now? How do you make a spiritual family? You share the gospel. And you say, well, yeah, Pastor, that's why I think we're all supposed to be missionaries. I agree with that part. But if you think that means not to do the ordinary things, that's the part I'm trying to help. We are supposed to be making disciples of the people in our sphere of influence. That is how the New Testament church was planted. There wasn't super duper, like super duper mega pastors in the first century. It was just Peter. He was a fisherman guy. And he shared the gospel. And then other people said, "Hey, did you hear what he said about Jesus? Go tell Grandma. Get Grandma over here. She needs to hear what he said about Jesus." "What? Are you saying that Jesus, that one we were hearing about that whole time, he's the Messiah? The promised Messiah?" "Yeah, he rose from the dead. We need to tell people." That doesn't sound exciting, what I'm doing right there, does it? It doesn't sound special. That is what's supposed to be happening.

Do you think Grandma stopped being a grandma and became a full-time missionary? No, she praised the Lord and went back to taking care of her grandbabies. Work is not what you do until you do something significant. Work is significant. Do you understand what you're saying if you think your normal work is not significant? You're saying that the inventor of work, His work is not significant. He literally modeled our work week after His work week. He literally tells us to do it like He did it. And what did He do? He made dirt and fish. That doesn't sound extraordinary. It sounds like he made this beautiful thing called creation and this planet, and then he tells us, go use it and bring me glory with it. And in the process of the fall and everything that happened after Adam, there's going to be lost people in that planet, and I'm going to need you who are taking care of the planet to tell them about me. That's it. This is really basic. In fact, you might even say, for lack of a better word, it's ordinary. It hurts me when people think they're not living for the Lord and the things they're doing are clearly things that God spells out that glorifies Him. That hurts me. And I feel like you are— you're messing up if you do that. I am saying that. You're messing up. But you're not messing up so that you should go become a missionary. You're messing up so that you should focus and do your things as unto the Lord instead of thinking they're things you do until you do things unto the Lord. Taking care of your family and and making sure the air pressure is right in your tires, and making sure that your kids are taken care of and taught, and making sure your neighbor knows that you're a believer.

You know, it's interesting. What's the word in Spanish for world? Mundo. Mundo is also mundane. It's just mundane. The world is mundane. Wrong. Do you know what the word for world is in Greek? Cosmos, cosmic, big, significant. Isn't it interesting how a word can change a lot? If I say something is mundo versus if I say it's cosmic. Well, there's nothing in your life, not one thing in your life, your shoelaces are cosmic. They're not mundane. It's a tragedy if you don't think that you can do everything for the glory of God. I feel terrible for you if that's true. Learn to do everything for the glory of God, assuming it's not sin. Now, those are the actions. Now, we can go quickly through the attitudes. Paul talks about humility and submission being an attitude. Pretty ordinary, right? You're quiet. You're not trying to make a show of yourself. You're not trying to put yourself on display, right? And so the attitudes associated with ordinary are being of the same mind, not being wise in your own opinion. To live peaceably with all men, Paul says in that passage, to overcome evil with good. Instead of being caught up in whatever cause is the cause of the day and the most important thing that the world is telling us is most important, and even the Christian world telling us is most important, just having the right attitude of humility and submission instead of shouting and causes and fighting for your rights.

You know, I always say it, if Jesus walked by right now, most of us wouldn't recognize Him. Well, we would, as mostly Caucasian Americans, we would notice a Middle Eastern person walking by. But Jesus is just a Middle Eastern guy. He doesn't glow. I mean, he did that one time, but he doesn't, in his earthly form, make a splash. It literally says that we wouldn't recognize him. We wouldn't find anything special in him. Jesus would not have a big social media presence if he were alive. Humility, submission. Another thing is loving God and loving people, his people and all people. It's interesting, Jesus is asked, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" And Jesus said to him, "What is the great commandment?" So you want to hear from the Lord. You want to hear the great commandment, the thing that God commands that is the most great, the things that Jesus says is the greatest thing. What does He say? He says, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself." Well, Jesus, that's boring. You're just telling me that my life should be loving God and loving people? What about where I get to make a splash? What about where I get my name in lights? What about if I get my name on books or I have a lot of followers or I have a massive media presence? Or I can be an activist to the point of really making change on earth. What did Solomon tell us in Ecclesiastes? What is the end? To fear God and keep His commandments. And what does Jesus say are the great commandments? Love God and love people. That's essentially a way of saying fear God and keep His commandments. Really boring, really ordinary. Instead of self-promotion, God promotion. Instead of self-fulfillment, God fulfillment.

I think sometimes people think of God very little in their day-to-day lives. And then if they are Christian, if they're born again and they're Christian, they know that they're supposed to be doing something for God. So in their day-to-day lives, they're not thinking of God while they're mowing their lawn. They're not thinking of God while they make that same meal they made 1,000 times for their kids. They're not thinking of God when they're doing the laundry and folding it. And ugh, I hate folding laundry. So they're not thinking of the Lord, and then they think, man, I feel like I'm wasting my life over here. I need to go over here and do something really big. So they compensate for all this little ordinary stuff, and they go over here and they think the answer is I need to do something big for the Lord. I need to make a splash for the Lord. So I'm gonna give $1,000 in the offering plate. I'm going to go on a missions trip and really make a difference for the Lord. And they're missing all that glory they could be giving Him. Now, that doesn't mean you shouldn't give $1,000. That doesn't mean you shouldn't go on the mission field. It doesn't mean you shouldn't become a missionary or a pastor. It doesn't mean that. I just want to make sure you don't have a false dichotomy in your mind that says, unless I'm in full-time ministry, all I am is ordinary and not bringing God glory. In fact, I might say, if you don't bring God glory in all those ordinary things, you shouldn't be a pastor or a missionary. 'Cause you don't see the significance of helping people glorify God in the normal day-to-day things. So love for God and love for His people. If you love people, you will help them and point them to the glory of God. You'll glorify God yourself and then you'll help them to it.

Now aptitude means some thoughts and areas of our life where we can get sharper in our understanding so that we can glorify God more proficiently, more on purpose, more with intention so that you can, this is like building the muscle of being a God glorifier in ordinary things. That's what I mean by aptitude. And so in the Lord's Prayer, the model prayer, it isn't the Lord's Prayer that he prayed, it's the prayer he taught us to pray, right? In the model prayer, one of the things he says is give us this day our influence, honor, followers, Significance? No. What does he say? What did Paul tell Timothy? Godliness with contentment, with food and shelter be content. Huh, sounds like the Lord's Prayer is also saying with food be content. Why? Why would the Lord say that? How can he miss out? Doesn't he know that food is just the thing you have to do? The significance is when you're really like an evangelist or a missionary or a preacher or a teacher. You hear people say it all the time, "Oh, I can't sing. I would never sing at church." You know what they're saying is, "You people who sing are super duper special." "Oh, I can't do what Pearl can do in playing piano. Pearl must be better than all of us." That's what we're doing when we do that. We're saying they, those people, the preacher, the teacher, the singer, the piano player, they are extraordinary. And so God clearly gets more glory out of them. That's why I read the books on the missionaries, because God gets more glory out of them. No one has ever said, "I am way unqualified to take out the trash at the church. I could never do that. That is only for the elite of the elite super spiritual people to take out the trash at the church."

Just this week we had trash in the church and we talked about taking bags, you know, because it was keeping up over the top. It got taken. I don't know if you know, does anybody in here know right now? I'm not gonna name him because I don't want to embarrass him. I might name him. But do you know every week, it has been for a good long time now, one person puts the garbage cans from over there out to the street. Every week. They've been quietly doing it like a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord. Now do you think of that as ordinary? Or do you think God loves that that person is serving their church like that? Which of those makes more sense? I have to do it, Jim. It's Jim Collins. The Bible names him, so I'm gonna name him. The Bible names Epaphroditus and all those guys that serve. But Jim's a great example in that because he also serves as a WANA commander and treasurer and other things that he does. Why does he do that? Does Jim want attention? Does he want us right now to all stand and applaud him? He would hate that if that happened. He just shook his head. I'm sure that would I would get punched for that later. I'm bringing it up as an example. People like— you don't see almost every week when there's stuff out there on the landing, even when he's carrying Paul, Zachary gets the blower out and blows off the landing out there so that the landing doesn't have leaves and stuff on it. These kind of things that are— we might think, well, I could do that, but I couldn't do the super special extraordinary thing of preach or teach. Get that out of your mind. If God says food can glorify him, if God says obeying your earthly masters can glorify him, that means the attitude is daily bread glorifies God. He gives you daily bread so that you will give him daily glory. Don't think of bread as the thing that fuels you to go do something significant. Say, I'm asking for bread, and it is significant that I got it.

What happened when the people of Israel stopped thanking God for the manna? What is manna? Well, manna is, "What is it?" That's what the word means, right? I don't know what this is. But when God gave them manna from heaven, first it's a miracle. He saved us. He rescued us. How long is it before they're complaining about the ordinary manna that is literally miraculously provided for them every day? So we can get caught up in this idea that the thing that happens every day or the thing that's normal, taking out the garbage cans at church, we can think of that as low. And we might have something that something else is high. And that's wrong to think of it. Again, there are things that you can do and be excellent at. I don't want to say that it isn't significant to be a pastor or a missionary or whatever, evangelist, to commit to sharing the gospel all the time. Those things are special and they are beautiful. But I just want to make sure that we don't pendulum swing and say it is either only ministry, full-time ministry, teaching at the church, preaching at the church, evangelizing, going to change the world through missions, doing something. I don't know, Ukraine or Africa or something, those are significant. But just taking out the trash in my church, that's just taking out the trash in my church. Wrong. Wrong.

I was just downstairs earlier getting a quick drink of water. And in the hallway, there was a piece of paper, a shred of paper that was the edge of a spiral notebook page. Somebody tore out the page, but the part that was left inside the spiral, you know what I'm talking about? The frayed stuff gets left behind a little sliver of paper. And it was laying on the floor. And I'm bragging right now. So you all just put up with Sloan bragging for a second, OK? Because I never get to just brag. But I'm bragging. I walked by, and I almost just walked past it. I walked by it because I didn't know where the cups were for the water because I'd never gotten water out of the water cooler before. So I was looking for the cups at the coffee table. There isn't any cups there. So oh, I look over. I see the cups. And I'm walking. And by walking, I walk past the hallway And I see that little shred of paper. And I almost kept walking because it's just a piece of paper on the ground, right? It's just a piece of paper on the ground. You know what it is? It's an ordinary piece of paper on the ground. And as I take my first step past it, no, no, no, no, no, no. There's no way I'm going to go up there and preach to my church that I love that every little thing counts and miss an opportunity to do a little thing that counts. So I picked up that little piece of paper.

Now again, you know I'm not bragging. I would not take credit for that. But I did see that. This is something that nobody's watching right now. This is something that I can do for the glory of God. I just have the luxury of bragging because I'm in front of all of you. But I hope you understand what I'm saying when I say that. I hope you understand that there are no insignificant things if the thing can glorify God. You can't call it insignificant if it glorifies God. And what you can do is change the significance of it in your mind to make it a thing that you can use to glorify God. That's what you can do. The thing is the thing. It's a little shred of paper on the ground. It's a hammer you have to swing. It's a wire nut you have to twist. It's a lawn you have to mow. It's a paintbrush you have to roll. It's wires you have to put together in a panel. It's a diaper you have to change, a meal you have to make. Those things are, according to everyone in our world, insignificant, except for we recognize this is not our world. It's God's world, and he created it, and he created us to be fruitful and multiply in it, to have dominion in it, to be fruitful stewards of his things in it. And so being productive and working hard are doing things that God does that might be called ordinary, but remember, ordinary is good. And I get to glorify God by swinging a hammer or rolling a paintbrush or spraying for weeds in my farm.

Paul says that if he gives everything to the poor, wouldn't we call that extraordinary? Would you call it extraordinary if somebody gave everything they had to the poor. We would say, "Oh, write a book about that person. Write a book about a person who says they bestow all their goods to feed the poor. That person is extraordinary." And what does Paul say? If I don't have Christian love, what is that? It's void, vain, worthless. Or those people who say, "Lord, we prophesied in your name. We did many wonderful things in your name. We were very extraordinary. We were preachers." in ministry. And then the Lord says to those who don't know him, depart from me, I never knew you. Day-to-day bread for day-to-day glory.

So the first warning I have— boy, we're over time— the first warning I have in closing is please don't mistake laziness for contentment. I don't have time right now to be nice to you and to put the right amount of butter and sugar on this so it doesn't go down easy. It's possible that you think you're content, but you're lazy. I would suggest to you that the Laodiceans were very content before they were spit out of the Lord's mouth as lukewarm. Please don't mistake laziness for contentment. Don't think that because you are happy with your lot in life that you are faithful to the Lord. You could be lazy. You could be ineffective. You could be ordinary and bad. Not ordinary and ordered and good. So please, if you are lazy and trying to call it contentment, change that. The way you would change that is by fulfilling the Great Commission to love God and love your neighbor. And you love your neighbor by sharing the gospel, by planting churches, by growth personally and ecclesiastically.

The other thing is mistaking being busy for for being productive. There's a lot of people who are very busy and they say, "Yeah, my life isn't ordinary, but if it's ordinary, I'm really, really busy in my ordinary life." That might mean that you're busy doing the wrong things, things that don't build the kingdom, things that don't glorify the Lord. In other words, you've gotten a lot done, but— and you say, "Look, I got a lot done," but it isn't for the glory of the Lord. You're not seeing it as you fulfilling His call on your life. I'm really thankful for my wife these days because I could have predicted she would be a great grandmother, an awesome grandmother, not great grandmother, but an awesome grandmother. I could have predicted that, but I could not have predicted just how wonderful she's doing at it, being a grandma. I'm so thankful my granddaughter has her. What if my wife doesn't see her role in my granddaughter's life as ordinary in the best way, ordered by God. She does see it that way, but what if she didn't? What if she thought that my granddaughter was here for her happiness rather than us all here for the Lord's happiness? Significance is not necessarily the thing that brings God glory. It can be, bring God glory in an ordered, planned, determined life. Tomorrow, when my alarm goes off, will begin the day of glory. Right? By the way, you should do it tonight too. I'm not saying it has to wait till tomorrow.

And the last thing I will tell you is, just by way of emphasis before we go into communion time, is please make sure you understand that the main thing God is doing on planet Earth, that all of those ordinary things— you can imagine a wheel with lots of spokes on it, and you have the hub of that wheel. The hub of that wheel is God is building his kingdom. He's building his kingdom on earth. So God does not want you even glorifying God at home if you're not interested in eternity and building his kingdom. Your glory at home and your peaceable life at home and your provision at home is for you on the outside of that spoke to build the hub. So your ordinary life that I'm telling you to glorify God in and to change those diapers and to mow that lawn and to swing that hammer for the glory of God, that is all God God providing for you so that you can be equipped and functional in doing the Great Commission. Again, either, maybe it means a missionary, maybe it means that. But also as a Christian, do good to the household of faith, Paul says in Galatians. Do not use your liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but serve one another, Paul says. So in order to glorify God even in the ordinary things, you have to have your focus be His focus. Or His focus be your focus is the way to say that better. And His focus is building the kingdom. So figure out the way that you can do your ordinary things and build the kingdom. Be a part of the church. Find your place in the church, whether that's taking out the garbage or teaching a Sunday school class, it doesn't matter. Serving, serving the ladies of church, being a part of the building things at the church, being a part of outreaches of the church. Whatever those things might be that your normal, ordinary, good life where God provides for you and your family, where you glorify Him there, make sure you understand that He's allowing you to do that so that you can contribute to the building of His kingdom. It's important for us to see that, that church is what God is doing on earth. Okay? Church is what God is doing on earth. Not building your house. Your house is to build the church. Your house is out on the spoke. And your house is supposed to be building the kingdom.

Let's pray. Father, now as we go into this communion time, we would ask that we would not fall for any of our world's definitions of special or significant, that we would see your word is full of things that we might think of insignificant as glorifying you. We do want to glorify you, and maybe, Father, it might even encourage us to do those things more intently for your glory. But also, Father, in the end, as we go into communion time, thinking of the high price paid so that we could be a part of the Church of Jesus Christ, that we would focus on that for our world, that we would use our ordinary lives to share the gospel. And of course, Father, if you are putting it on someone's heart to enter into full-time ministry or to do more, to do missions, to do those kind of things, to contribute in a in a different or more focused way in ministry. Obviously, Father, we want to answer those calls and direction in our life, but I really would ask, Father, we would all leave here focused on our day-to-day glory, even now as we go into communion. And we thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, deacons.