We are living in days of big, horrible, hard things happening, and we can feel so small and overwhelmed.

We want our big God to show up in big ways, but we are living in days of the small things.

Bags of food given to local families. Kits packed for Afghan refugees. Donations sent to UMCOR for disaster relief. Words of encouragement spoken to those who are hurting.

Do not despise the day of small things.

Zechariah spoke those words to the Israelites who had returned from the Babylonian exile and set out to rebuild the temple. What they found when they got there was a great pile of rubble.

But the Lord said, “What are you, O mighty mountain? Before Zerubbabel you will become level ground. Then he will bring out the capstone to shouts of ‘God bless it! God bless it!’ “ (Zechariah 4:7)

This mountain then became a plain as the Israelites set out to do the work of moving one rock after another. The Israelites were living through days of small things, moving each of those rocks. And although some of the people despised this new temple because it was different and smaller than the first one, in Haggai 2:9 the Lord tells the people through the prophet, “The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house. And in this place I will grant peace.”

The small will one day be small no longer.

The days of small things remained with the Israelites until every mountain was laid low and the true temple arrived in the person of Jesus.

How do we hold on during our day of small things?

We remember that God’s grace is always sufficient for us. The Lord tells Paul in 2 Corinthians 12, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

In 2 Corinthians, Paul shares in his letter that the apostles “were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead.”

We are relying on God, who raises the dead. Don’t gloss over this. God’s grace was sufficient to raise Jesus from the dead. God’s grace will be sufficient for us to get through these days of big, hard things. In our days of small things.

Lord God, we will not despise these days of small things. We lift our eyes to You, amidst all the suffering and the heartache in this world. We are holding fast to Your Word and Your promises, knowing our work is not in vain. Strengthen us in these days, Lord, to do the work of moving each rock, each obstacle, knowing Your grace is always enough. Amen.