I’m answering this one purely off the top of my head. I can’t see myself as having accomplished much. It would be a very boring book 😀. However, so many of us are ordinary. It’s a pity that Hitler and many like him weren’t more ordinary.
But I’m thankful for extraordinary people who’ve done good and who’ve accomplished great things for humanity. One of my heroes is the Apostle Paul. He described himself as the chief of sinners.
1 Timothy 1:15
This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
I don’t think that he was ever that, but he was so thankful to God for turning his life around. To the early church, before his conversion, maybe he would have seemed like the chief of sinners. He was their chief persecutor, and in persecuting them, he was persecuting Jesus.
Acts 9:4
He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
But when confronted with the risen Jesus, he was quick to turn around. He was always zealous to do the right thing, but before his conversion, he had been confused about what the right thing was. And after his conversion, his name was changed to Paul, and he became the most prominent New Testament church leader, spreading the gospel to Europe and writing most of the New Testament epistles.
But when I think about it, great leaders such as Paul had an impact, but ordinary people, like me, can also have an impact. And of course, God Himself is working through us all. All our hope rests on Him.
So, I can’t really see myself being remembered here on earth for very long after my death. I love to study great hymns and discover the life stories of great hymn writers. Yesterday, I wrote about “Blessed Assurance”, written by a blind lady, Fanny Crosby, who wrote 8,000 hymns. I could try writing a hymn, but I don’t imagine that anyone would want to sing it – and certainly not those alive 200 years time 😀. Yet, I’m one of the millions who sing “Blessed Assurance”, and I’m one of the millions who’ll sing around God’s throne in heaven. Isn’t that better than making a name for yourself on earth and not ending up in heaven? And who knows what we’re accomplishing when we pray? Perhaps we’re making a greater difference than we realize. I pray for a different country every day. This year, I’m following Operation World‘s daily prayers. So, today’s country is Algeria. In my own small way, I can bless the people there. I watched a video about Algeria last night. It showed a Roman Catholic Cathedral in Algiers with the motto:
“Our Lady of Africa, pray for us and for Muslims.”
I’m not a Catholic, so I don’t believe that we can pray to Mary. But I was pleased to see the word “prayer” and that Muslims weren’t seen as an enemy. I pray for harmony and freedom in all nations and that people would at least have the freedom to hear the gospel and other points of view and be free to practice any religion or no religion.
So that’s my answer. And I’ll end with a couple of songs about ordinary people and the special place that they have in God’s heart.
Hibernia Gospel 
1. I didn’t know that “acceptation” was a word so I’ve learned something new. Thanks. 2. My favourite apostle is my namesake John, who I believe was a very special person, and a survivor, dying of old age, which was an achievement in itself considering.
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Thanks for your comment. 😀 You had me wondering where I used the word “acceptation” – I just discovered that it was in the 1 Timothy 1:15 verse that I quoted. I used the old King James version for that verse, because it used the term “Chief” (I was making the point that Paul called himself the Chief of Sinners) – I generally quote from the NIV, a modern version. So, the King James is 17th Century English. But “acceptation” is still used nowadays, but only in formal contexts. I don’t ever remember using it myself. 😀. Yeah, it’s true that John was very special. He was particularly close to Jesus. His gospel was written later than the others and tends to focus more on the teaching of Jesus than events.
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Don’t you think Paul was a bit monomaniacal, even after his conversion? I’m not as well studied in Paul’s theology as you are, but I get that impression – that in some ways he didn’t change, his zealousness, for example, he just came over from the Dark Side. There’ a Star Wars reference. LOL! 😜
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Yeah – that’s a good point. I suppose that you need all kinds of personalities in the church and in society. He was an apostle, so he did have special authority. But yeah, I would imagine that anyone who knew him in his earlier years would recognize the same personality even if he changed his beliefs.
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I like this. We all fall short in the eyes of God and he knows we are not perfect. We must learn from the sins we do and try to do better. We can’t go out and sin all our life then except to be saved at the end. I am not sure that is how it works. I know we have to believe in our hearts and souls that Jesus died for us so we can have the chance to have a better life. We have the best gift in the world God gave us and that is free will. How we choose to live our lives is up to us. How we learn from our mistakes and how we handle the things we get into is up to us. We decide what kind of person we want to be and we have to choose to be for God or not. No one is made of perfection but we just try to be the best we can every day.
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