The story of a night it became very obvious that little things mean a lot to God…
My wife annoyed me the other night. Then she inspired me.
Let’s be clear, she did absolutely nothing that should have annoyed me. I was just in a mood to be annoyed.
She came into the kitchen as I finished cooking dinner.
I was cooking what our family calls, “The Whole Chicken Dinner”. Mashed potatoes, gravy, oven baked lemon pepper Parmesan chicken, and my famous “salad with no lettuce”.
(It’s so famous, we say, that it’s known from one end of our house to the other.)
That dinner is one of our family comfort meals. But the last part of the preparation is anything but comforting…
- Mash the potatoes…
- Make the gravy…
- (Keep stirring. Don’t let the gravy get too thick!)
- Keep the chicken warm…
- Finish the vegetables at the same time as the rest of the meal…
As I was in the midst of all that final preparation, my innocent wife walked into the kitchen and asked an innocent question…
“Is the salad ready?”
“Sure it is”, I replied, and elevating passive aggressiveness to an advanced art form, I dished up the salad, sat down at the table and left the rest of the meal sitting unfinished in its pots and pans.
My wife, being the smart and mature person in the family, totally ignored what I had done. Silently she put the chicken and mashed potatoes and vegetables on plates, set them on the table and then sat down.
“You say grace”, she said.
I ended with, “And thank you, God for letting me a love a wife who is a lot nicer to me than I deserve.”
She had done a little thing. It meant a lot.
After dinner, I walked into the family room. Our cat went on immediate alert, watching my every move.
If I get anywhere near a chair or the sofa after dinner, the cat will curl up next to me.
Remembering my cell phone was in a bedroom, I turned around and started up the stairs. She followed, meowing at every step.
Picking up my phone, I headed back down stairs. The cat was so sure of what would happen next she ran ahead of me. Stopping at the sofa, she turned and stood there meowing.
As soon as I sat down, she was on the sofa, purring.
She had done a little thing. It meant a lot.
Little things mean a lot in relationships.
Is that true in our relationship with God?
Do Little things mean a lot to God?
Does God Himself use little things to accomplish His purposes?
He fed 5,000 people with only five loaves and two fishes…
Mathew 14:12 “And they said to Him, “We have here only five loaves and two fish””
Mathew 14:17 “Now those who had eaten were about five thousand men, besides women and children”
He came to earth not as a conquering hero but as a Baby…
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
He compared the entire kingdom of Heaven to the tiniest seed on earth…
Matthew 13:31-32 He told them another parable; “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches
He appeared to Elijah in a whisper not a whirlwind…
1 Kings 19:11-13 The LORD said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.” Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah
Could God be saying that if we overlook the little things, we might miss His presence?
Could he be saying that what we consider the little things might really be the big things –that they might rally be his way of turning us into who and whose He wants us to be?
Luke 16:10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much
