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It’s Monday morning, so there is the school run, a car service, a full inbox and a list of tasks for home and work. The washing is on the line, a meeting runs long, you check in on a neighbour and then cook dinner. So, the week rolls on till Sunday, and for an hour or two life feels “spiritual” again. If you know that rhythm, you’re not alone. For many of us the week is divided into two compartments: the sacred bits (church, Bible reading, prayer) and the secular bits (everything else).

J. I. Packer once observed that the Puritans knew nothing of this divide. For them all of life was God’s, and everything was done to his glory. Modern Christians tend to live fragmented lives, feeling swamped and distracted, shuffling between compartments that never quite connect. Living in a secular culture, we easily view most of life the way our neighbours do, with nothing to do with God. Only the “religious” parts really count.

The sacred/secular split is a problem. When Christians can’t see how the routines of home, work, community and leisure matter to God, our discipleship shrivels. Our everyday activities don’t connect with following Jesus. In a culture where people are hungry for meaning, we miss the chance to show that the gospel gives purpose to the details of an ordinary day.

The Bible gives us a far richer vision centred on Christ.

Whatever you do

Paul tells the Colossians: “Whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col 3:17). “Word and deed” is Paul’s shorthand for the whole of life — everything we say and everything we do. Nothing is left out. And it is all to be done “in the name of the Lord Jesus”, because believers belong to Christ entirely: we have died with him, been raised with him, and our lives are hidden with him in God.

How does Christ give significance to the ordinary? One way to show that is to work through the framework of the “threefold office” of Christ. Christ our Redeemer is prophet, priest and king and each office is relevant to everyday life.

Christ the King over all of life

Christ rules everything because he made everything. He is “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation… all things have been created through him and for him … in him all things hold together” (Col 1:15–17). There is no corner of life, no kitchen, no worksite, no footy field, no classroom, that belongs to anyone else. The rain that falls on your garden and the food on your table come from him.

The Creator is also the Redeemer. Risen from the dead, Christ has supremacy “in everything” (Col 1:18). His rule isn’t only over church things; it reclaims the whole created order, including the daily life that sin has disordered. We know that disorder well: we grumble about routines, turn good gifts into idols, daydream of escape to something more exciting. Christ’s restoring rule teaches us instead to discern the created goodness in the everyday and receive it from him with thanks.

When you do the laundry to serve Christ by serving the family, hang it on the line thankful for the sunshine and sort it so each piece goes to the right bedroom, you live under and share in his rule.

Christ the Prophet who speaks to all of life

As prophet, Christ reveals God’s will. The Bible, which is Jesus prophetic word, has much to say about ordinary living. The Shema calls Israel to love the Lord with all their heart, soul and strength, and to talk about his word at home and on the road, lying down and getting up, that’s every moment and movement (Deut 6:4–9). The Ten Commandments touch on time, family, work, property, truth-telling. The Proverbs get gloriously practical: laziness and diligence, how we speak, friendship, family life. Jesus teaches his disciples about enemies, marriage, money, parents and the poor. The letters instruct wives, husbands, children, workers and employers, which in the ancient world meant addressing nearly the whole of daily existence.

Scripture, in other words, refuses to divide life into sacred and secular boxes. Because there is one Lord, every sphere of life comes under him. Christ the prophet has plenty to say about your days.

Take one Proverb as an example: “whoever walks in integrity walks securely” (Prov 10:9). This describes someone “whose inmost desire is to bring all of life into harmony with God and the others in his life”. A life committed to the Lord in every part is free from anxiety, characterized by a “sense of well-being and security” because the Lord watches over our steps (Prov. 2:7b; 3:23; 13:6; 18:10; 28:18; Ps. 25:21; Isa. 33:15–16).^[1]

Christ the Priest for all of life

You might think the priestly theme is where the sacred–secular divide belongs. In old Israel, after all, only priests could enter the holy places; ordinary Israelites lived at a distance, and everyday things like meals, sickness, childbirth, could make a person ritually unclean. But the prophets looked forward to a day when that would change. Zechariah pictures a future in which even the bells of the horses and every cooking pot in Jerusalem is inscribed “Holy to the Lord” (Zech 14:20–21). Everything holy, right down to the pots and pans.

Christ fulfils that hope. He is the true temple, and in him his people are holy and appointed priests (1 Pet 2:5, 9). The food laws are gone; everything God has made is good and is “consecrated by the word of God and prayer” (1 Tim 4:4–5). Our whole lives become “living sacrifices”, our “true and proper worship” (Rom 12:1). That means thankfulness at the dinner table, faithfulness at work, kindness to a neighbour and rest well taken are spiritual sacrifices offered to God through Christ.

Living it out

How can we pursue an everyday life with Christ as prophet, priest and king?

This is bigger than a “theology of work”. Paid employment matters, but so do the domestic chores, the sick neighbour, the game of backyard cricket. In Christ, every avocation is a vocation.

Preach and teach the big vision. People need to hear, regularly, that Christ rules over, speaks to and blesses the whole of life. Preachers should draw out what biblical law, wisdom, Jesus’ teaching and the apostles’ writings mean for work, home, money, speech and rest.

Talk about everyday life in discipleship. Bring the school run, the workplace and the caring responsibilities into small groups and pastoral conversations and connect them with Scripture. The Bible is full of pictures of ordinary life, and instruction in how to live it. Let’s dwell on that together.

Pray the ordinary. Resources like Every Moment Holy offer prayers for everything from cooking a hurried meal to changing a nappy. These are small liturgies that train us to see each moment as lived before God. Of course, we don’t need prepared words; it might be even richer to learn to step into each moment of life dedicating it to the Lord in our own words.

Our culture has lost the sacredness of the everyday. The gospel gives it back. In Christ, God has sanctified every moment and movement of the average day. So, whatever you do, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus.

– John McClean. See “ ‘Do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus’ — Christ for everyday life” Gospel Leadership April 9, 2026 https://doi.org/10.56505/001c.159578.

^[1] John A. Kitchen, Proverbs (Mentor, 2006), 220.