What does it take to know that our lives are extraordinary?  In the midst of diaper changing, grocery shopping, mowing the lawn; that we, each one of us, is a world changer.  For one friend, it took being saturated in the unknown and uncomfortable.

She stands before the church in aqua cardigan, mother of three.  The heart beats fast and hard in the chest.  I see it in the quiver of the paper she holds. Her first time to do this:  join a mission trip to Haiti and then share in words what happens to change the soul in seven days.

And she speaks honest. About how it all feels counterintuitive before the feet hit foreign soil.  The way she leaves three children behind with her husband, the schedules, responsibilities, so she can go somewhere she has never been, to do something she has no experience doing.

Admits wondering how she, someone with no medical skill, will assist physicians, minister to the sick.  Says she is nothing.

And that word, nothing, it wets the eyes.  Because don’t we have to become nothing in order for God to reveal the something?

God chose things despised by the world, things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important. ~I Corinthians 1:28

And the beauty spills from the words she reads.  Not just about hundreds that receive medical attention, donated supplies worth more than the salary of some, but in how she discovers her value in the dust of the pause in-between patients. The holy revealed in the sacrament of presence.  How when the soul cries hungry, she gives bread that sustains life.  And this gift she gives, it is worth more than experience and skill.

The way of humility – He must increase, but I must decrease. ~John 3:30 – it grows gratitude, yields joy, reveals the extraordinary.

But this feeling extraordinary, it comes easy on foreign soil, among the desperate for what we have to give. But what about when we come back home? To homework, laundry, hungry mouths, full schedules.  It seems to hide in the shadows. 

So does extraordinary living only comes to the ones on a stage with a platform?  To those with large groups of followers on Facebook and Twitter, a high Klout score, the word author behind their name.  Among the lucky enough to live in the right neighborhood with full wallets and lots of friends.

What do you think?

Anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. ~Matthew 8:4

Maybe the posture of humility found in gratitude is the way to unearth extraordinary amidst the mundane of the everyday. Because in the place of humble thanks, becoming less, He uncovers truth, gives more of Himself, more of His gifts – and that is truly extraordinary, world changing life.

Will you join me in giving thanks today?  And then come back and tell me how this discipline uncovers grace, reveals the way you uniquely change the world in your everyday extraordinary life.

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Joining Ann today, continuing to make the list of gifts:

• For conversations: over a cup of coffee, around a dinner table, in rocking chairs outside.
• Friends that go on mission trips and come back to share the goodness.
• The red Dodge Charger rental car I will surprise my kids with in the pick-up line at school.
• A daughter who spends hours helping her brother do a math project with joy.
• The smell of pumpkin bread, because it makes them happy.
• Colors of fall, on branches and scattered on ground.
• Aha moments that bring life, expand perspective.

And Michelle at Graceful.