Have you ever wondered why Jesus chose mud to heal a blind man? Of all the methods at His disposal, He used something as simple and ordinary as mud.
In ancient Judea, mud was everywhere and used in nearly everything.
The people used mud as building materials. They used it for plastering walls. For health remedies, putting it on the skin to heal wounds and infections. For fixing broken pottery and repairing tools.
Mud was standard and available.
And here comes Jesus– a rabbi who could have chosen to heal this man in many ways using that standard and available element to demonstrate his power to the world.
He certainly had the means to heal differently. The healing could have been drastic and dramatic, garnering a considerable crowd. He could easily have made a spectacle.
When it comes to miracles, we often think they need to come from something extraordinary. We expect the shiny. The flashy. The big and the perfect. But Jesus used the ordinary over and over again within his expedited mission on earth:
The water turned into wine.
The five loaves of bread and two fish.
The elements of sheep and bread mixed with lilies and lamps within his storytelling.
There’s something deeply comforting in this truth: God’s miracles often don’t come wrapped in grandeur. They come when we choose to engage in the life right in front of us, from our willingness to be involved in the ordinary.
I think he did this to demonstrate to people that God’s Kingdom is right here—in our everyday lives.
God’s Kingdom is accessible. If we only look for God in the bigness of life, we miss so much of Him hiding out in plain sight. We miss the glory of God that lives in the ordinary.
But here’s the challenge: We often get distracted by what’s next. We wait for the big moments—conferences, parties, promotions—thinking that something grander will bring us more fulfillment. In doing so, we neglect the life right in front of us, where God is already at work in the ordinary.
I spent many years of my 20s thinking the present moment wasn’t good enough. I always thought I could be doing something so much fancier, so much more noteworthy. I could be traveling instead of cleaning my house. I could speak on stage instead of scrubbing the dishes or doing paperwork.
But I started to notice something curious within the Bible: God consistently used the present moment and circumstances. Where I was obsessed with the “elsewhere,” he showed up in the ordinary to make heaven kiss the earth.
Think about the Christmas story in Luke. Those shepherds who heard the good news before anyone else.
Imagine being a shepherd in that field. It’s late in the evening. You’re doing your ordinary, everyday work and minding your own business. You’re herding sheep—one of the most anticlimactic animals known to mankind. And then, out of nowhere, an angel appears.
You’ve never seen an angel before, so you’re struggling to conceive that one is standing right before you. Of all the people this angel could visit, why you? That seems pretty unlikely. After all, you’re a shepherd. You’re an outsider. You’re despised by society. You’re doing “lowly” work. And yet God chooses you. He chooses you and your version of the “mud”—daily life’s ordinary elements—to share history’s best news.
What if one of those shepherds decided that night, “You know what, I’m over this. I’m so tired of showing up to this calling. I am going to go off and forge my own path.” He would have missed what God was doing.
What if one of those shepherds was distracted or disinterested? What if they immediately discounted the moment because they didn’t believe the divine could possibly appear in their own ordinary story?
I love how God showed up to these men as they stayed present in their calling and did not abandon their responsibilities for something fancier.
They were rooted.
They were present.
They were ordinary.
And that’s where the power of God is made manifest.
As we’ve been talking about a new vision and a deeper sight for God’s things, I think we have to continually shift our mindset: God can meet us in the ordinary. God uses ordinary elements.
The cups of coffee. The conversations with friends. The prayer walks.
He lives in these things.
The bedtime routines with our kids. The meals around the table. The well-worn prayer we’ve prayed for years. The lines of our journals.
He lives in these things.
The marriage counseling. The daily workout. The work emails.
He lives in these things.
Something happens when we decide:
“I cannot see the entire future, and much of life feels quite mundane right now, but I can work with today. I can see what’s right in front of me– the mud that feels as common as my daily bread. And I believe God is meeting me with these ordinary elements. He’s here, in my midst, and I refuse to miss it.”
