Friday, May 18, 2012

Five Minute Friday - Normal



What is normal?  What does normal mean to you?  And why am I even asking this question?  I ponder.  Did you know that on this blogger template there is a normal font and a normal size of print?  Normal is used a lot in our language.  


Normal means the same, common, usual, average, customary, habitual, ordinary, regular, run-of-the-mill, and typical.  Normal is what we crave when things go awry.  Normal invades our daily habits.  Normal equates our activities to an apathetic level.


A normal day brings sameness and regularity.  Normal brings consistent patterns of behavior that can run you into a rut.  We can aimlessly go through a normal life.  We tend to caught up in our own little worlds, traveling in our own little circles, then all of a sudden...out of nowhere...life happens in the middle of our normal.


We get slapped with cancer, money issues, surgery, hate, the Spirit, kindness, injury, death, loss of job, pride, etc.  The list of bad things can go on and on.  So could the list of good things.  My point is when there is a shift in either direction, we want our lives to return to the same, the normal.    


After thinking about this, what I crave is something completely atypical.  That's the "normal" that I want.  I have convinced that I will always have the not-normal.  That means I will have problems but it also means that I will have many opportunities for God to work in and through my life.


Normal means that I am just drifting through this life unchanged.


Normal controls so that we stay within the limitations of our own strength.  We choose life events so that things will go according to our wills.  We defy God's directions to experience Him.  Normal is safe.     


With my recent inconsistency in normal, I have realized that I don't really want what I thought was normal.  I don't want calm waters, I don't need God there.  But in the not-normal, it forces me to be dependent on God, which is where I want to be.  I can be consistent in God's path to peace, which requires my total dependence on His strength.  


I am good with being a not-normal-changed-follower of Christ.  


Are you content with your normal?

4 comments:

Female in Motion said...

God calls us to be a peculiar people. Some of us, like me, are more peculiar than others! ~ Carol

Anonymous said...

Jesus was a rebel!! Normal is overrated!
@JeremiahDunagan

Unknown said...

Who needs normal? :) Thanks, Janelle!!

Anonymous said...

I would agree... "Normal" isn't one of the first words I'd use to describe you. :) ~ Anon.