Experience the Joy of an Ordinary Life

Most people expect more out of life than God ever intended to put into it.  That statement is based on one Willa Cather wrote about a character and her expectation of love.  But it applies just as well to the way people think about life.  We all seem to want more than we have, but is that the main reason we were born: to see how much stuff we can accumulate?  Which reminds me of that old bumper sticker, “Whoever dies with the most toys, still dies.”  How much of all the stuff you accumulate will you be able to take with you when that day comes? 

Ecclesiastes 5:10 tells us, “Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income.”  Sadly, most people seem to love money and what it can by more than they love life itself.  Which means people are always frustrated, always feel they are not getting their fair share.  They see what other people have and believe they deserve as much.  I think this is one of the reasons so many people are so anger today.  They all feel cheated.  But why?

I am not suggesting we need to lower our expectations, just change them.  Instead of focusing on the material side of life, we should be focusing on the spiritual side.  When we reach the end of this life, do we think God is going to do an accounting of how much money we were able to accumulate?  Or, is it more likely that God is going to do an accounting of how many hours we spent laughing, how many people’s lives we affected positively, how many children we played with, how many sunsets we watched in awe, how many flowers we smelled, how often we savored the taste of a good meal or a fine wine, how many times we smiled, how many people we made feel like they were seen and heard, how much love we shared, and especially how often we told God how grateful we were for all the blessings God had bestowed upon us?  

Most of us will only be remembered by the small group of family and friends we associate with us throughout our lives.  Most of us are not going to be rich and famous; we are just going to live and die as regular, ordinary people, and what’s wrong with that?  Too many people trying to be more than God intended them to be miss the important things in life, the reason God gave us life in the first place:  to be aware of the beauty of God’s great creation, to add to it, and to experience God’s love and to share that love with one another.  The richest people are not those with the most, but those who have enough.  To be truly happy in life, we need to be satisfied with and grateful for what we have.  How sad to live a long life only to discover at the end of our days, we missed the point and wasted the opportunity God gave us to be truly happy and at peace.