Doing Things, Great and Small

Mar 15, 2010 | The Good Word

Mother Teresa once said, “In this life we cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.” This morning someone asked me what I wanted my impact in this life to be, and this is what came out of my fingertips:

Honestly, I am not sure what my impact is going to look like. From what I’ve seen of my walk with God so far, it has been the small things done with great kindness that has had the greatest impact. The people I have seen come to know the Lord have been individuals who I have personally “walked the road” with for a long time. I want to write and speak and touch thousands of lives, but I am starting to think the best way for that to happen is by just touching one. And it seems to me that if Jesus spent 3 years mainly teaching and working with 12 guys, He was setting an example for us to see. When we’re faithful with a little, God can give us more to be faithful with.

After I thought about it, I realised how incredibly true it is, that the Lord has shown me this principle in my walk with Him. The places where I felt closest to the heart of God were the places when I left behind the 99 to go after the one. When I stopped and sat down with a guy on a cold street in Edinburgh, bought him a hot chocolate and eventually a Bible. When I stopped an international student on my university campus to ask if she needed any help, and how she was settling in a new country. (Seven years later, she is still walking with Jesus.) When I sat with a man in a town square in Mexico, though he spoke Mayan and not much Spanish and we bumbled along with little conversation. When I held on to hope for another international student for two and a half years, and wept with tears of joy the day she was baptized. It is often in taking note of the one, doing the small things with great love, that we are taking note of the heart of God.

Jesus stopped for the one:

• the one Samaritan woman with a poor reputation at the well
• the one woman with the flow of blood who would’ve been considered ‘untouchable’ in His day
• the one over-tax-collecting “piece of work” Zacchaeus who climbed a tree to see Him
• the one Blind Bartimaeus at the roadside
• children, children and more children, one at a time
• the one little boy with epilepsy who was constantly falling into the fire
• the one gentile woman who asked for healing for her daughter

This list could go on and on. And on. But the point is, Jesus showed us that no matter where He was headed, what mission He was on His way to accomplish, He always had time for the one.

Do you have dreams of greatness? Do you have dreams of speaking to millions? Touching millions? Reaching millions? The best way to start is by touching one. And there is one in your life every day. Ask God to renew your mind to see the one, and to see what you can do. If together, as believers, we are all doing small things with great love, we will be doing a very big thing, indeed, and the world will know that our love is the love of God.