"There are no small roles, only small actors."
Oh sure, it sounds sweet. It sounds comforting and encouraging, but really it's just something we all say to try to make our crying a bit more minimal after looking at a disappointing cast list. Let's be honest, if you audition for a play, you want a good role. You want to feel like your audition led to something great. Sometimes that doesn't happen, so we console ourselves by saying there are no small roles, but when we're honest, we really wish we had gotten that bigger part. Still, as frustrating as that cliche can be, it has a lot of truth in it, a lot of truth that I have come to understand in big ways lately.
I've been discovering that in God's grand story there are no small roles. We are all invited to participate in what God is doing to redeem this world, and we are not divided into giant saints and little helpers. All who choose to surrender their lives to God and His plan have huge, grand roles in His story, even when those roles seem so small.
I've been feeling fairly small lately. When preparing to graduate college I told God to send me anywhere to do anything. I braced myself for a calling to a remote village filled with poverty like I have never seen. I was ready to sit with an orphan on my lap singing songs about Jesus in some foreign language. I figured my calling might not be exactly that, but I anticipated something in that larger than life category. After all, all the books I read about people surrendering to God always involved them being called to some great adventure. So I prayed, and I surrendered, and...
I got sent back home.
That's right, my deep times of mediation and surrendering, my time of Bible study, all led me to the same conclusion. I needed to move home, move back in with my parents, work a part time nannying job and volunteer at church. When I finally accepted that this was what I was hearing, I looked up to God and said one word,
"Really?"
Honestly, I had told God I would go anywhere, and I meant anywhere. I had said I would do whatever He called me to do. That act of surrender was supposed to be the beginning of some crazy experience that other people would look at and think, "Wow, God is really using her." (Even as I write this, I see how prideful and void of surrender my thought process was, but it's how I felt.) This whole, move home concept made no sense to me. I wanted something bigger. Yet, I heard go home, so to home I went.
I've been home for about two months now, and just this past week heard of an opportunity to go get a full-time job in Family Ministries, something I am hugely passionate about. As I prayed about it, I found myself wrestling with God once more. "Stay here" was the message I was getting, but it wasn't the one I wanted. I still craved something bigger. However, as I heard, "stay here," I also heard a question. God continuously asked me,
"Who defines big?"
I needed to think about who I was allowing to dictate my life. Was I living for the approval of the people around me, of the people I assumed expect me to do great things with my life? Was I letting the world's perception of big dictate my actions or was I seeking only to please God? When I had told God anywhere, did I mean it, or did I only mean anywhere big and exciting?
Finally this morning I let go. I told God that I would trust Him. I know that my entire life is worship, so I decided I would live for Him even in what I saw as small. Today at church eight people got baptized. I got to teach babies the truth of God and build deeper relationships with some of the kids' parents. I got to be a part of a youth ministry that is deeply impacting the lives of many teenagers. All of this may not be book worthy, but it's not small. These things are huge, not because of me, but because God is moving. I'm just honored and humbled that He would even choose to work through me.
So I'm embracing my call to stay, because in God's story saying, "there are no small roles," is not a cliche. It's the truth.
