The Ordinariness of Faith
The Ordinariness of Faith
Topic: encouragement, faith, righteousness
The Bible is unique among sacred texts and ancient documents in many ways. One way you may not have considered before is the geographical centricity of its contents. The ancient Israelites and early Christians populated the eastern coast of the Mediterranean—right in the middle of all the world’s early empires: the Sumerians, the Egyptians, the Hittites, the Elamites, the Phoenicians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians, the Greeks, and the Romans. Consequently, the Bible refers to every single one of these empires.
Even more fascinating, the Bible shares scenes involving the leaders of eight of those empires, with numerous Egyptian pharaohs, Assyrian and Babylonian kings, Persian shahs, and Roman emperors playing key roles. Many of these people or events are also recorded in secular history, corroborating the biblical record.
Surprisingly, however, these nations and rulers are never the main characters. The figures approaching closest to center stage are the unnamed pharaohs in Exodus, King Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel, and King Xerxes in Esther—but even in their stories, God does not primarily work through these high-profile leaders. Instead, the key players are frequently ordinary people. Sure, we have six books about the kings of Israel and Judah, but even in those books, the kings are rarely the hero. More often, we read of the priests, the prophets, and ordinary people whose lives became extraordinary through the workings of God.
Joseph began his adult life as the slave of a well-to-do Egyptian officer. He came from the fourth generation of a dysfunctional family, twisted up with adultery, secrets, lies, and frequent backstabbing to get ahead in the race for the inheritance. Joseph was a victim of the family politics, and he could no longer hope to receive even a portion of his father’s inheritance.
David was also the last child (or one of the last) of a productive household. He was the eighth son of Jesse, and although he was talented and good-looking, he was not from a noble family. Saul was the extraordinary one—tall, good-looking, and wealthy.
A few prophets (like Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Zechariah ben Jehoiada) were priests; some were of royal blood (including Daniel). Yet many were regular people: Amos was a sheepherder; Elisha was a farmer.
One of the most ordinary people of all was Jesus. In fact, Jesus’s life was so extraordinarily ordinary that when He began to perform extraordinary miracles in His hometown of three decades, nobody believed Him.
“He has no stately form or majesty
that we should look upon Him,
nor appearance that we should desire Him.
He was despised and forsaken of men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and like one from whom men hide their face
He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.” (Isa 53:2–3)
Jesus was perfectly capable of retaining His divine nature as a man; living as a poor carpenter was no more demeaning than the “elevated” humanity of a wealthy king.
The Apostles were common fishermen and ordinary Jews. Jesus selected men without education and training.
“Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and comprehended that they were uneducated and ordinary men, they were marveling, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.” (Acts 4:13)
I saw something this week estimating that Jesus only selected the Twelve halfway through His ministry. In other words, they only studied directly under Jesus for about a year and a half.
Ordinary Temptations
The saints of old not only experienced temptation, they were not immune to its allure. Many of them fell into devastating sin.
- Abraham: the “father of the faithful” began with a huge lack of faith when he fled to Egypt
- Moses: the “meekest man on earth” could not enter the Promised Land because he lost his patience and did not honor God
- David: the “man after God’s own heart” took Bathsheba and murdered her husband
- Elijah and Jeremiah: the most resilient of God’s prophets just wanted to give up and only persevered because God intervened
- Apostles: the pillars of the church all ran away from Jesus’s trial
Listen to Paul’s encouraging words to the Corinthians after chewing them out for their numerous sins:
“Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall. No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man, but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.” (1 Cor 10:12–13)
In other words, the temptations and trials you face are not new. You are not the first person to face them, to give in to them, nor to overcome them. The temptations we face are universal.
This includes Jesus as well.
“For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things like we are, yet without sin.” (Heb 4:15)
Ordinary Faith
We often call Hebrews 11 the “Hall of Faith,” but most of the people were very regular people. Their faith took years to manifest, and it frequently did so in peculiarly ordinary ways. Of course, we do read of the amazing sacrifices some people made, enduring torture and murder for their faith:
“…others were tortured, not accepting their release, so that they might obtain a better resurrection; and others experienced mockings and floggings, yes, also chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword. They went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, mistreated (of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in desolate places and mountains and caves and holes in the ground.” (Heb 11:35–38)
Nevertheless, the faith we see as heroic and perceive as profound only manifests as such by enduring trials. This makes perfect sense when we understand the relationship between biblical faith and what we usually call “trust.” You only appreciate how profoundly someone trusts you when you have a significant test to provide a frame of reference. Yet that same deep trust and faith may still motivate behaviors that are much more shallow in everyday life.
As an easy example, I would like to consider the trust (or faith) Ruth had in her mother-in-law. Before her husband’s death, Ruth forged an intimate, trusting relationship with her mother-in-law Naomi. I am certain this manifested in myriad ordinary ways during Mahlon’s life. Yet after his death, Ruth reveals how deeply she really trusts in Naomi. This isn’t a new faith, but we see for the first time how far Ruth is willing to go on Naomi’s behalf. She’s willing to travel to another country, learn a new language, give up her friends, accept discrimination, and even submit to a different God—because she has confidence in Naomi.
In much the same way, although it was refined and revealed by trial, the mind-blowing faith of men and women who gave their lives up for the Lord did not appear from nowhere. They forged it in the fires of daily troubles.
If you do not have small faith, you will not ever display great faith. If instead you cultivate and tend to a small faith, it will grow much greater than you could anticipate.
“And the apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith!’
And the Lord said, ‘If you have faith like a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and be planted in the sea”; and it would obey you.'” (Luke 17:5–6)
Consider also the righteousness and faith of Elijah; although Elijah was one of the greatest prophets in the Old Testament, he was an ordinary man! Listen to the words of James:
“Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. Then he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the earth produced its fruit.” (Jas 5:17–18)
Our ability to interact with God is not affected by riches, fame, power, personality, or other material characteristics. Rather, it is enhanced by our relationship and connection with God.
Jesus’s greatest example was in sacrificing His life. His second greatest was the thirty-or-so years He lived before His ministry—about which you cannot read a thing, save that—
“[Jesus] went down with them and came to Nazareth, and He continued in subjection to them, and His mother was treasuring all these things in her heart. And Jesus was advancing in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.” (Luke 2:51–52)
In other words, He exemplified ordinary righteousness toward God and man.
Extraordinary Purpose
Jesus calls us to surpassing, extraordinary righteousness:
For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matt 5:20)
And yet this extraordinary righteousness germinates in the ordinary and daily trusting of God. Through the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus raises the bar higher and higher until it seems unattainable. Then Jesus looks out over His discouraged crowd, and says these comforting words:
“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And which of you by worrying can add a single cubit to his life span? And why are you worried about clothing?
Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’ For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matt 6:25–34)
Don’t worry about trying to produce extraordinary faith and righteousness—just enough for a day. Trust God for today.
God calls us from ordinariness into extraordinariness. Through ordinary faith, we receive extraordinary promises.
Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist! Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. (Matt 11:11)