A quick question, please:  How are things with your quotidian life?

Unless you’re a very vocabulary-minded person, you probably don’t know the meaning of that word, (at least, I didn’t know its meaning until I looked it up in the dictionary.)  No, you may not know the definition of the word, but I guarantee you know the concept it represents.

Every day when our feet hit the floor, quotidian events begin. We brush our teeth.  We take showers.  Some of us may even eat corn flakes with bananas on them.  Our lives are defined by quotidian elements  In fact, without the quotidian unfoldings of life, we might even be confused and need a lot of direction.  I suppose you could say the quotidian things comprise most of life.

So, have you guessed the meaning of quotidian yet … and what quotidian elements have you come to depend upon for nurture, support, and spiritual strength?  Are you paying enough attention to the quotidian stuff in your life?

Quotidian things are those things we would mark as “daily” happenings.  Any event or activity that is quotidian is daily.  It’s a fact: I lived almost all of my life without knowing the meaning of the word quotidian, until I saw it used in a book the other day and looked it up in the dictionary. But as soon as I read the definition of that word, I began to reflect on the idea behind the word. What happens in my life every day is important. And the daily-ness of my life and my faith is extremely important to God.

Ps. 68:19 says, “Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens.” I don’t care how you spell it. Knowing His strength is a daily provision I can depend on represents a wonderful blessing. How good of God to remind me in His Word that He is not only aware of my burdens, He shares in lifting and carrying the load of my struggles. And He bears those burdens … on a daily basis throughout my life.

Yes, God has promised to be with me daily. But what about the ‘daily’ part of my life, my living?

Prov. 8:34   “Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway.” I love that verse because it involves ‘listening’ to God, ‘watching’ for God, and ‘waiting’ for God … on a daily basis. No question about it. Every day I listen to, every day I watch for His goodness in my life, every day I wait for God to instruct, lead, guide? Every day I do that is a blessed day, for sure.

Luke 9:23 says we need to take up his cross daily, and follow him. And Hebr. 3:13   to encourage one another daily. I have to be honest in sharing with you that my great challenge in life up to this point has not been that I didn’t known the meaning of the word, ‘quotidian,’ but rather that I have known the meaning of the word, ‘daily.’ Being a ‘do-er’ of the word — being a do-er of daily, I guess you could say — that is constant challenge.

1Ths. 4:11, 12 the Apostle Paul wrote to those in the early church, “Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.”

We all know that no two days are exactly alike. And yet, the non-debatables, the non-negotiables, the elements I insist be part of each and every day will define how I am known to others, and how I will navigate the seas of life. Listen again to what He has promised:

Prov. 8:34   “Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway.” No question about it. Every day I listen to Him, every day I watch for His goodness in my life, every day I wait for God to instruct, lead, guide? If I do those things so often that they become DAILY occurrences? That’s God’s definition of a blessed life.

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