The Secret Life That Is Not So Secret

An ordinary day, an ordinary guy doing ordinary everyday things.  That is the basis for the new movie The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, based on a classic short story just a few pages long, written by James Thurber in 1939.

The compelling story is not the ordinariness of his life, but how the extraordinary emerges from it, bursts forth and changes the course not only of Walter's life, but all those around him.  Walter "zones out" into daydreams that quite suddenly help him to see ordinary things -- even conflict -- with different eyes.  He actually visualizes a different outcome.

And when we focus on God,
         how different life can be.
God can transform
      the most ordinary situation,
    the most volatile relationships,
       the mundane or the scary
into what is extraordinary,
into what only He can do.

How can I think differently about this situation,
      this relationship,
      that person?
Only by laying it before the LORD,
             wrapped in His Word,
              and marinated in prayer.
How can I pray differently?
What other words can I use?
What else can I do?
What Scriptures apply to this?
How can I trust Him more
                even in this?
Not to get my way,
         but follow fully His way..

This is the secret life that cannot remain secret ,
but manifests itself to all.
God makes all things new,
           and it starts with me.

It impacts everything on my radar,
      it empowers me to
                 see beyond even that
   to what is not ordinary at all.
It is all significant in God's eyes.
Nothing for naught,
       as my sweet grandmother would say.

So I am not just "dealing" with a tough job,
or "handling" a squabble,
or even walking into an ordinary day,
but God changes my myopic vision to know
How can I practice grace in this?

Walter Mitty zoned out of reality
          to find the extraordinary,
but God breaks us out of our own imaginings
     and opens our eyes
            not just to possibilities,
     but to what is really real.

It is not that He makes all things new,
         but He makes us new.
And that changes everything.

Remember not the former things,
nor consider the things of old.
Behold, I am doing a new thing;
now it springs forth,
do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
                and rivers in the desert.

                               Isaiah 43. 18-19