Goodness in the Little Things

I find it easy to get discouraged when I have cleaned everyday and still my house looks like the tazmanian devil ran through here. Sometimes the piles of laundry and dishes and diapers and toys overwhelm me and I wonder what the purpose is in continuing to trudge along in the “mundane” tasks of life if they can’t stay clean and put away. Surely, there is no glory in cleaning a toilet or washing the dishes. But I was encouraged by something I read recently, from The Fruitful Life by Jerry Bridges (excellent read!. Here are a two of my favorite excerpts from Chapter 8:

“We all have a tendency to rise to the special occasions of our lives, but God has created us to do our good works in the midst of the humdrum daily living.”

“True goodness is not only self-sacrificing but also untiring. It does not ‘become weary in doing good’ (Galatians 6:9). It is one thing to do good in a few, or even a number of, isolated instances; it is quite another to face cheerfully the prospect of doing some particular deed of goodness day in and day out for an interminable period of time, particularly if those deeds are taken for granted. But true goodness does not look to the recipients or even to the results, of its deeds for its reward. It looks to God alone, and, finding His smile of approval, it gains the needed strength to carry on.”