More often than not, on any day of the week, you will probably find me in the kitchen. I am sure to have frizzy hair and a red, sweaty face. Most likely my dark pants will have a floury handprint or two on them. I may be making a batch of flour tortillas or whipping up some more yogurt or stirring granola––okay, maybe all of the above at the same time and ruining most of it in my cooking frenzy.
If I’m not in the kitchen then I’m in our homeschool room, convincing my 8 year old that math is fun or in the bathroom lecturing my 3 year old about playing with the toothpaste again. Or, maybe I’m chasing the dog out of the house or asking my 5 year old to stop trying to wash the car with the kitchen sponge.
If I’m not in those places, I’m probably at the gate visiting with a neighbor or at the grocery store trying to find that one ingredient that the stores in town suddenly stopped carrying or bartering at the fruit market for mangoes.
People often ask me what I do all day. Actually, my day-to-day life is pretty ordinary. Redundant. Mundane. I’m a stay-at-home mom who happens to live in Indonesia.
It used to really bother me that I was stuck home all day while my husband flew into remote villages to help people. It was as if my primary ministry to my family wasn’t enough because it wasn’t full of adventure or tales of radical conversions. It didn’t feel like what I thought “ministry” should feel like. My husband always comes home with such big stories. I wanted to have big stories too.
God has been patiently teaching me that the work He has given me to do daily is indeed ministry and it is big––to my husband, my kids, my neighbors, and, most importantly, to the Lord. He desires my full attention and faithfulness to the work set before me because, to Him, it is an important ministry––a ministry He is equipping me to do with excellence.
Who needs big stories when you know you are serving a Big God?
“Work hard and cheerfully at all you do, just as though you were working for the Lord and not merely for your masters, remembering that it is the Lord Christ who is going to pay you, giving you your full portion of all he owns. He is the one you are really working for.” — Colossians 4:23,24 (NLT)
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