Common Things

“You are a very fine person, Mr. Baggins, and I am very fond of you; but you are only quite a little fellow in a wide world after all!”

“Thank goodness!” said Bilbo laughing, and handed (Gandalf) the tobacco-jar.

J.R.R. Tolkien

I don’t know that I ever aspired to greatness, but these days, thank goodness, I don't have to be great. I can be a little fellow in the wide, wide world, and stay close to home. I can love those nearby and leave the salvation of the world to those who are younger, stronger, brighter and better at it than I. I’ve wondered at times if I’ve gotten slothful; I rather think I’ve just gotten old.

An aging friend wrote to me the other day bewailing her loss of opportunity. Publishers no longer clamor for her manuscripts; churches no longer call on her to speak.  She’s trying to adjust, she said, to a snail-like pace of life.

“Thank goodness,” I wrote in reply. “More time now to love and to pray; more time for reading and contemplation; more time to develop intimacy with Jesus and with our other friends; more time to enjoy our Lord’s presence in creation; more time for ordinary duties; more time for common things.”

Ruth Bell Graham has written...

Lord, let mine be

a common place

while here.

His was a common one;

He seems so near

when I am working

at some ordinary task.

Lord, let mine be

a common one, I ask.

Give me the things to do

that others shun,

I am not gifted or so poised

Lord, as some.

I am best fitted

for the common things,

and I am happy so.

It always brings

a sense of fellowship

with Him Who learned

to do the lowly things

that others spurned:

to wear the simple clothes,

the common dress,

to gather in His arms

and gently bless

(and He was busy, too)

a little child,

to lay his hand upon

the one defiled,

to walk with sinners

down some narrow street,

to kneel Himself

and wash men’s dusty feet.

To ride a common foal,

to work with wood,

to dwell with common folk,

eat common food;

and then upon the city dump

to die for me

Lord, common things

are all I ask

of Thee.

DHR