Luke 16:10 - “One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much”​

The Beauty of Small Things

We live in a world obsessed with big things – the bigger the better, in fact. Not in terms of size, necessarily, but certainly in terms of what we deem to be important, or impressive or valuable (and let’s be honest, our judgment of these things aren’t always that great either).



Let me illustrate what I mean; we tend to think that a crowd of 10 000 is better than a crowd of 10, a building with 100 storeys impresses us more than a building with only 5, having 1 car is necessary while having three or four is great... “More, more, more, bigger, bigger, bigger”, is the mantra of the world we live in and the philosophies we live by. Or so it seems to me at least, but I suspect I am not alone in this observation?



We are never fully satisfied, instead we always want more or bigger because we assume this is better.



Now maybe this speaks to our sense of ambition and desire to achieve – if that were the case it is a good thing because there can never be progress without a desire to achieve or succeed. But on the other hand it could also speak to our sense of greed and insatiable desire to accumulate – and if that were the case it is an altogether terrible thing. For now I will let you be the judge of why we are obsessed with the bigger and more of this world... I am not so much concerned about our reasons for this obsession as I am about the spiritual implications of it, and that is what I want us to reflect on briefly.



See, because we are so obsessed with the ‘big things’ we tend to ignore or neglect or under-value the so-called ‘small things’. This is a sad consequence of our obsession with the big things and it has a particularly devastating impact on our relationship with God.



When we neglect the ‘small things’ in our spiritual journeys (the brief prayers, short readings, quick conversations, small gifts, the passing moments, opportunities to listen, simple efforts to do good, etc) we neglect the very things that will lead to bigger moments. See friends, God is not so much concerned about the big things as he is about the small things that lead to bigger things.



In Luke 16:10 Jesus says, “One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much, and one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much”. Jesus doesn’t say this because he doesn’t care about the ‘much’, he says this because he understands that the ‘much’ begins with the ‘little’ and if we don’t appreciate and deal well with the ‘little’ then it doesn’t matter how ‘much’ we have it will be wasted, or ill-used, or not valued appropriately.



We will never be able to pray for an hour if we are not willing to take the 5minutes we have available now to pray; we will never be able to read ten chapters of Scripture unless we are willing to start with 1; we will never be able to proclaim the Gospel to a crowd of hundreds if we are not willing to share our faith with the person next door... See where this is going? We will never reach the ‘big things’ spiritually (and this is a bad way to put it anyway), unless we learn to value the ‘little things’ and learn to see them as the ‘big things’ also.

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A final thought for today... “Take time to enjoy the little things, because one day we will realize they are actually the big things!”