Re-enchant the Ordinary

Common things can help bring us together, to fulfill the deep longing for feeling connected. We have elements of home that we share with one another as we invite others into our place of comfort and rest. We have food set out on a table, that brings together open conversation that dives into hopes and dreams. Our ordinary sights on the way to and from work too often can become dull or mundane, when they could be something magical everyday if we look upon each new day with fresh eyes and thankfulness.

Imaginative stories of C.S. Lewis and J. R.R. Tolkien help show us, and even push us into something more, and in a richer sense we see nature as enchanted, as we see with new eyes that which God created. What it means to be human - to commune with the transcendent God. This is something we can do all the time, and yet, we are always looking to the greener space over there, somewhere in the distance. Never content with what we have before us, or missing it completely.

Here is a story of our lives. Reaching a place in our own wisdom, learning, and growth that rests in feeling content. The people we get to see each day, the comfort of home we get to wake up to, the beautiful trees we live next to, the conversations we get to take part in are all things that many others strive for. Our daily routine is blessed in so many ways, and it holds a myriad of reasons to look upon it with an admiration of the ordinary. 

May God bless our most common things, for that is what we see and use the most. Our ordinary time at the office, our regular drive, all the meetings, or errands after work is filled with potential. Do we see the beauty of what we have with clear eyes, or are they all muddled with the muddiness of our own moods? When we read The Lord of the Rings, we come out looking at trees differently - with great appreciation. They are not just objects that we can cut down for planks. We look at them knowing they fulfill their purpose by being very important trees, and we imagine them talking to one another in their slow, deep voices. Unbeknownst to me, my whole neighborhood of trees converse every night while I am asleep. 

Our job is to see these common things with eyes that re-enchant the ordinary, and to let those things remind us of God's great gifts we already have in our lives.