babette ate oatmeal

(yes. I'm a Gilmore junkie. I admit it.)

So there's something that really frustrates me about Christianity and the Church. (Actually, there are a lot of things that frustrate me, but this post is only about one ... so on with the rant ...) There seems to be this line of thought or belief or theme or something that states when one prays, "God, use me." that God's use of you will be monumental. People say that they're scared to use that prayer because they're afraid of what will be asked of them. Why is it that the feeling is that being used by God means that He'll ask you to sell all of your belongings and move to a tiki hut in the middle of Africa to preach to the aborigines who only speak African clicking languages? Why must everything be newsworthy? Why do we assume that we'll be there to see and know that what we did was huge and a major impact in someone's life? Doesn't the Bible tell us that we're not always there to see the fruits of our labor? Why can't God using you look like you smiling at the cashier at Wal-Mart? Why can't it be feeding a friend dinner one night? Why can't it be sending an email or calling someone you're thinking about right then? How do we know that our small, seemingly insignificant actions don't mean the world to someone?

And so - this begs yet another question. Why must everything newsworthy be huge? We're the one's who define "newsworthy", so why not redefine it? I know that Tyler and I have been monumentally blessed and gifted by friends who thought they were doing nothing more than feeding us dinner. It was mundane to them - but monumental to us. We felt it was newsworthy. But did they ever realize that? Were they ever meant to? I don't know the answers to those questions. But, what I do know is that we too often overlook the mundane because it doesn't seem monumental to us. Perhaps we should shift our focus? Maybe that's the idea. Maybe the idea is to not be afraid of moving to Africa ...

God, use me.