I have to be honest and say that I don’t often think of myself as being a world-changer. When I hear of men and women who are really making a difference in our world, I think of people that are way more qualified than me. I’m not trying to sound super humble or anything but I just have difficulty imagining myself really making a big difference. One of the things I love about Jonathan Edwards as I’ve been working through his 70 resolutions is that he did not seem to take himself seriously but he took God very seriously. His 63rd resolution was…

On the supposition, that there never was to be but one individual in the world, at any one time, who was properly a complete Christian, in all respects of a right stamp, having Christianity always shining in its true lustre, and appearing excellent and lovely, from whatever part and under whatever character viewed: Resolved, To act just as I would do, if I strove with all my might to be that one, who should live in my time.

He knew that he had a responsibility. He knew that if he did what he could only do, God would meet him and use him to do the incredible. It’s easy to look at someone who has changed the world and think that they must have known they would change the world before they did. I forget that they were just ordinary people who believed that they could make a difference with God’s help. They didn’t know about all the books that would be written about them and they didn’t know the overall impact of their efforts. All they knew was that they had a responsibility given to them by God and that they needed to be faithful.

It would be easy for us to disqualify ourselves. We’re not smart enough. Our past is too checkered. We didn’t have the right upbringing. We don’t have the right gifts or the right circumstances…you get the point. We can always make excuses as to why we are not the right kind of people to change the world. Every single world-changer that has ever lived had those same feelings and those same doubts. They just chose to press through them and do what they felt called to do trusting that God would use them as he saw fit.

Where does that leave us? It may seem like just changing diapers. Just going to work. Just writing a blog post. Just a small company. If we will faithfully and vigorously do what God has called us to do, he has a way of using ordinary people to do extraordinary things.