Finding freedom, purpose and joy in life’s mundane
Author of Sacred
Mundane

Q: The word “mundane” usually has a
negative connotation. How do you define mundane?
Mundane refers to the ordinary, everyday,
commonplace, unexciting stuff of life. Yes, it does usually have a negative
connotation, and that’s the point! We tend to devalue and despise the mundane,
but that is where our transformation takes place. When we overlook this area,
we miss the greatest catalyst for effecting true change in our lives. For
Naaman, the Jordan River had negative connotations, which was why God led him
to dip down into those waters. It is precisely the waters we most want to avoid
where our transformation is found.
Q:
Explain the life-sentence exercise you ask your readers to do in the
introduction of Sacred Mundane.
In 2 Kings, we read, “Naaman was a mighty man
of valor, but he was a leper.” He had so much going for him, but his leprosy
threatened to steal it all. I ask readers to consider their own lives and
prayerfully simmer down their own life into a sentence. We all have so much
going for us; we are made in the image of God with gifts, skills,
relationships, abilities, potential . . . but
there’s something that limits, hinders, robs, and binds us, and in quiet,
prayerful moments it will likely come to the surface. There’s something we just
can’t kick. So often we’re vaguely aware of the areas we want to change, but we
don’t take the time to narrow down and identify the one thing that most hinders
us. We feel overwhelmed or discouraged. Identifying the one thing helps us see more
clearly how God wants to use our mundane to make us more like Him.
Q:
You write we all have something that limits our freedom, confuses our purpose,
and steals our joy that we try to hide from others yet it continues to grow.
How do we identify what that thing is and remove it from our lives?
The good news is that God wants us free even
more than we do. As we sit quietly before Him and genuinely desire to hear from
Him, He will show us. We could also ask a close friend, spouse, or someone who
truly loves us, “What one thing do you see keeping me from being all God
created me to be?” I find it helpful
to think of it not as something that’s “wrong with us,” but simply something
that’s keeping us from being all God made us to be. It wasn’t Naaman’s fault he
had leprosy. Some of our hang-ups are the result of our poor choices, some are
a result of what others have done to us, and some are just the consequences of
living in a fallen world. The point isn’t to determine whose “fault” it is or
to shame us for our weakness or issue, but to find wholeness, freedom, joy.
Q:
How does desperation lead to transformation?
Change is hard, but it happens when the
discomfort of our problem exceeds the discomfort of changing. When we are
finally sick to death of a situation, when we’ve had it with this struggle,
that’s when we really seek change. In recovery circles, we would call it “rock
bottom” — we each have to reach rock bottom in our situation before we are truly
ready to change. My hope is readers have
reached their rock bottom or find it in reading the book and become ready to do
whatever it takes to let God change their lives.
Q:
Why is it sometimes unsettling to let God into our lives when He is right
outside, knocking on the door?
It’s unsettling because it means letting go
of control. Our greatest temptation will always be to want to rule our own
lives, to be our own God, and to do it our way. However, God loves us too much
to let us do that because He knows we’ll do a terrible job. We aren’t God, and
we were never meant to be. He’s the only One who can handle the weight of that
responsibility, so He patiently knocks and waits for us to let Him in. We’re
hesitant because of fear and not wanting to give up control. We forget how good
He is and how He always is working for our good . . . if only we could trust
Him more.
Q:
When you were in college, you were on fire for God, yet miserable at the same
time. Why were you so unhappy during this period of time?
Life was so very ordinary and full of
disappointment. The man I loved had just broken my heart and told me we would
never be together (we are now married), my job was full of mundane, tedious
tasks, my relationships, especially with my roommate, included the usual
conflict and awkwardness, plus I had the challenges of leading 400 college
students. I hadn’t yet learned all of life — even the struggling, frustration,
irritating, disappointing parts — were part of my sacred offering to God. I
genuinely wanted to please God, so it was life-changing for me to realize I
could please Him simply by offering up every ordinary day as a sacrifice of
praise to Him. Hebrews 13:15 says through Jesus’ sacrifice of atonement we can
offer our sacrifice of praise.
Q: On
your blog (also named Sacred Mundane), you wrote, “Several years ago God
wrecked us for ‘normal,’ and we started doing weird stuff.” What exactly did
you and your husband start doing?
By nature, I am very introverted. I like my
space, my stuff, and my organized, controlled, neat, and tidy life. I wanted a
secure retirement account, a successful writing career, security, and other
things like that. In 2010, my husband and I read The Hole in our Gospel, and God completely turned our world upside
down. Even though we’d “known” these things, we’d never really known them.
We began seeing the kingdom of God is all
about giving away, taking the low seat, preferring others, and storing up
treasure in heaven. We sold our dream home and moved to “the other side of the
tracks” into a dumpy little rental to plant a church in a lower-income area. We
opened up our home and started living in community. We became involved with
those coming out of alcohol addiction and even had some ladies live with us who
were coming out of homelessness and addiction. For a few years we gave half our
income away, and I will be giving away 100% of my proceeds from this book.
None of this is spectacular — lots of people
are doing the same — but from the world’s perspective, it’s weird. In fact, our
local TV news did a story on our downsize and our commitment to frugality
because it seemed strange. Apparently following Jesus is weird to the world! Why
would you give half your income away? Why would you downsize unless you had to?
Why would you let unsavory people into your home? Because Jesus is awesome, and
we finally saw the value in investing in the Kingdom more than in our own
little temporal kingdom here on earth.
Q: Why
is the mundane so sacred, and how can we learn to embrace it?
The mundane is sacred because that’s where we
live. It’s the majority of our lives.
Sure, we have some mountaintop experiences. We have vacations and high moments;
we have wedding days and exhilarating experiences. But the vast majority of our
lives is spent in the midst of ordinary days, so that is why it’s so sacred — because it’s where we live, it’s where
God is, dwelling inside us by His Spirit. It’s where our guard is down, and
we’re not performing; we’re just our raw and real selves, doing our raw and
real thing, and that is where God meets us and makes us more like Him.
Learn more about Sacred Mundane and read Patterson’s
Sacred Mundane blog at www.karipatterson.com. She is also active on Facebook (sacredmundane) and Twitter (@sacredmundane).
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