Elisabeth Elliot: Mrs. Dubose, the head mistress of the boarding school that I attended in Florida way back in the 1940's, used to say to us again and again, "It's those tiny little things in your life that are going to crack you up when you get out of this school."

Lisa Barry: I think she was right. It's never the big jobs I have trouble with. It's things like keeping my cool when someone tailgates me on the highway or trying to settle the trivial disputes of preschoolers that really do me in.

Today on Gateway To Joy, Elisabeth Elliot finishes up our series called THE TRIVIAL ROUND with one final look at the everyday trials that put our faith to the test. Here she is.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says. "And underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, completing today a series called "the trivial round."

I took those three words from an old hymn, written back in 1822, by John Keble. I'll read you six stanzas. I think there are more, but this particular hymnbook has six of them.

"New every morning is the love our wakening and uprising prove; through sleep and darkness safely brought, restored to life and power and thought.

New mercies each returning day around us hover while we pray. New perils passed, new sins forgiven, new thoughts of God, new hopes of heaven.

If on our daily course we set to hallow all we find, new treasures still of countless price God will provide for sacrifice.

Old friends, old scenes will lovelier be as more of heaven in each we see. Some softening gleam of love and prayer shall dawn on every cross and care.

The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask; room to deny ourselves, a road to bring us daily nearer God.

Only, O Lord, in Thy dear love fit us for perfect rest above, and help us, this and every day, to live more nearly as we pray."

Are you ambitious to do great things for God? Where do we start? Mrs. Dubose, the head mistress of the boarding school that I attended in Florida way back in the 1940's, used to say to us again and again, "It's those tiny little things in your life that are going to crack you up when you get out of this school." As she said that, she would place her thumb on her little finger of her right hand and she would shake her hand at us and say, "It's those tiny little things in your life that are going to crack you up," and she would clap her hands loudly, "when you get out of this school."

Well, of course, we kids made fun of that behind her back. We would put our thumb against our little finger and shake our hand at somebody that we thought was doing something rather carelessly. We would slap our hands together and say, "It's those tiny little things in your life that are going to crack you up when you get out of this school."

But you know what? Mrs. Dubose was right. Those tiny little things matter. How do you make your bed in the morning? That was one of the questions she wanted to know. How do you keep your drawers? What sort of shape is your notebook in? How thoroughly do you do your homework? How attentively do you listen to your teachers? How carefully do you set the table and wash the tablecloths? Yes, we had lots of housework to do in that school. But it was in the tiny things that the real proof for the pudding lay.

The prophet Zechariah wrote in chapter four, "Who hath despised the day of small things? For they shall rejoice and see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel with those seven. They are the eyes of the Lord, which run to and fro through the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose hearts are perfect toward Him."

Amy Carmichael was given the very great privilege of being an itinerant evangelist for about six or seven years when she first went to India as a missionary. God gave her fruit in that work which she loved. But later on, God opened her eyes to see the plight of little babies that were being committed to the Hindu temples for the purposes of prostitution.

Amy Carmichael began to pray that God would enable her to rescue some of those children. The answer to her prayer was that she became a mother to over 700 children. She could no longer itinerate and travel. "Children," she said, "tie the mother's feet." So she was mixing formulas for babies and washing diapers and walking the floor with sick children.

Was it not spiritual work compared to the evangelistic work that she had been doing? It was the work that God had assigned her. "The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask."

I think of Mrs. Kershaw, a humble servant who helped my mother with the housework, always cheerful, always looking for something that she could do that would make us all happier, always delighted to do whatever it was--whether it was ironing or washing or making sugar cookies for us or going in the back yard and picking rotten old apples and digging out the worms and peeling them and making applesauce. Mrs. Kershaw accepted the trivial round with grace and with joy.

I have a letter from a listener. Her name is Cindy. She says, "I was a pediatric ICU nurse for years. But when my husband's practice moved to Illinois, I decided I needed to stay home with my four children.

It wasn't a hard decision. What was hard was living out the decision. It was so exciting working in the ICU with very sick children and seeing them healed and to know that I was a big part of helping that to happen. Then staying home, as you know very well, was very demanding, and yet there was not the same excitement, nor was there any immediate gratification.

All in all, I have learned that I have to trust in Him to provide my everything. I had a fear that the world instills in us, when we allow it. I was afraid that my husband might cheat on me or leave me, and here I would be without a job and with four children. The Lord used you almost every day to speak to my spirit.

Each day I would get into the car to pick up my children at school and I would get the urge to turn on the radio, as opposed to listen to a C.D. There would be the perfect statement for what I needed to hear that day.

I have to say that there were many times it was not what I wanted to hear. But nevertheless, after many tears and the surrender of my will, I heard. I know you must meet a lot of resistance to your messages from the women in the church who maintain their feminist views and are now trying to incorporate them into the church."

Well, you're right, Cindy. Yes, I do receive a certain amount of resistance and criticism. But I do believe that God has made it clear in His Word what the position of a woman is in a marriage, in a home, or in the church.

Cindy goes on to say, "The best way to raise children is to be at home and raise them. I believe that we grow even more than they do. What better way to teach submission or death to self than to become a mother? God in His infinite wisdom has given us children to model what it must be like for Him in dealing with us."

Don't you love that? Listen to that sentence again. "God in His infinite wisdom has given us children to model what it must be like for Him in dealing with us."

She goes on to say, "I hear myself telling my children something and that still small voice speaks to me, 'Do you do that, too, Cindy?'"

Thank you, Cindy, for your letter. If your children are screaming, it's probably because you scream at them. If your children bite their nails, it could be because they've seen you bite your nails. Children are very astute, aren't they? They don't miss much. They see. They hear. The Lord has given to us, all of us in some form, trivial rounds.

If you're the man with the best, most lucrative job in the world, you still have to get there, don't you, from home. The trivial round perhaps involves driving in traffic or taking a train or a subway. "The trivial round, the common task, will furnish all we ought to ask; room to deny ourselves, a road to bring us daily nearer God. If on our daily course our mind be set to hallow all we find, new treasures still of countless price God will provide for sacrifice."

A comment from another listener: "May God continue to be the electricity and you the lightbulb. We only give off light because of the power source." She signs it, "Just another listener that you have touched." I do thank God for the privilege that He has given me of broadcasting. I know I am nothing but the lightbulb--absolutely helpless without the source.

Everything I say on this program, Gateway To Joy, I try to make sure is biblical. The Bible is my source. The Bible is my rulebook. If you hear me talking about something that you do not think lines up with what the Word of God says, I fully expect to hear from you. And I do hear from people who point out things, mistakes perhaps that I have made, doctrines which they feel that I am misinterpreting.

One lady wrote and said, "I don't usually agree with anyone." That's kind of interesting, isn't it? "I don't usually agree with anyone, but your biblical insight kept me nodding my head in agreement. Keep up the work you were called to in His holy name." Well, thank you, listeners, and may God give us a new vision of that trivial round--that we may make it an oblation, a glad, loving offering to our Heavenly Father.

Lisa Barry: I have to admit that since I've learned that my daily, mundane chores can be offered up as a fragrant offering to God, I feel a secret kind of joy--one that I ponder in my heart throughout the day. It's heartwarming to know that God is pleased with my labors of love for my family.

If what you've heard this week are things that you'd like to be applying in your daily life, then let me suggest you purchase a copy of this one-week series. It's called THE TRIVIAL ROUND. The cost is $7. You can send that, along with your request, to Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Our Internet ministry address is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy has been a production of Back to the Bible.

Monday Elisabeth reminds us that even in the midst of an evil that gets worse by the day, God has the bigger picture. We would all do well to focus our attention on that. It's all coming up on the Monday edition of Gateway To Joy. Have a great weekend.