Beauty in the Rare and the Mundane

I looked out the front door to catch a glimpse of my daughters playing outside -- the one thing I made them do on their day off.  That's when I saw it.  It was blue.  And very, very large.  A rare creature indeed.  Stopping my girls in their bicycle-laden tracks, it fluttered to a marigold.  The one I planted last spring that is now a bush.  Wanting to capture the rare and beautiful moment, I ran for my camera and clicked . . .

That's when it hit me.  The truth of my prejudice. 

I realized in that moment how enamored I am by the extraordinary.  How jealous I have become for the rare moment, relying on it alone to spark my gratitude meter and lead me into praise for my Creator.  I have let myself grow weary of ordinary living.  Instead of finding the beauty in the everyday and searching out the gifts in the commonplace that is my life, I've gotten lost in the pursuit of the exceptional.  Waiting for that remarkable moment to inspire awe for my Glorious King.  All the while I have grown accustomed to accepting the mundane in the everyday rather than finding the beauty in it.  I have come dangerously close to losing the ability to find any sort of significance in the daily grind.

But that is not what life is.  Not real life, anyway.  The abundant kind that Jesus came to give.  Because living doesn't just occur in those rare moments when I'm faced with the rare beauty of a big blue butterfly. No. Living happens when I choose to see the common of the everyday for the extraordinary gift that it is. It's recognizing the exquisite inside of the ordinary.

The thing is, I think if I choose to find the beauty in the regular moments of my life, that will only make the rare moments even more extraordinarily beautiful and awe-inspiring.

So I after I did my best to capture the rare big blue butterfly adorning my big orange marigolds, I looked over at the pajama-ed, bike-riding gifts that are my children.  And I thanked God for them.  Then later, I cuddled with them while watching the movie that we recorded last week while they were in school.

And when we put them to bed after a late-evening snack, I praised my Creator for the awe-inspiring moments that He ordained for me today.  Right there in the mundane of living my life.  And then I thanked Him for the big blue butterfly and the truth He chose to reveal to me because of it.

I'm linking up with Emily today.  Because that is what Tuesdays are all about over there.