Normal

Do you ever feel weird, different or just a few degrees off plum?  Do you ever wish your child wasn't so hyper, so chatty, so quiet?  Do you ever find yourself trying hard to fit into the crowd but just don't quite find a place?  Do you ever feel like a square peg individual in a round hole world?

Would you like to know why?  It is because you're not normal!  There, it has been said.  YOU ARE NOT NORMAL!  By the way, neither am I nor the person down the street or around the world.  While we tend to try to fit in with the herd, we were not made to be another of the same, you were made a unique individual: "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made" (Ps 139:14).

We are not made to be another just like the other, to go with the flow, to be one of the many - we were designed with skills, abilities, bents, attributes and inclinations that make us different - that prevents us from being normal or one more of the same.  Imagine if that were not true.  How boring would life be?  What if your spouse were just like you?  What if everyone at the office were just like you?  What if everyone you knew was just like you?  Are you thinking Zombie Apocalypse yet?

Listen to what the Bible has to say: "Now if the foot should say, 'Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,' it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,' it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body" (1 Cor 12:15-20).

We don't have to go along to get along.  We don't need to be like the rest to be a part of the group.  We don't need to be normal - we need to be ourselves, the person God made you, made me, made others to be.  Then we can bring into the group our unique vision, talent, likes, understanding and abilities to enhance the community - to bring what God gave each one of us to the mix.

We don't have to go along to get along.  Instead, we need to bring along those quirky, weird, unusual, different qualities and find a way to fit them into the whole, to find your place in the community not just take up another space.

Who wrote the book of normal?  And why would we want to be normal anyway?  Why not be who God made you to be and add flavor and spice to the world?  Don't be normal, be you.  Don't parrot the party line, add your insight.  Don't just join the crowd, increase the community.  Be the fearfully and wonderfully made individual God made you to be.  Jus' Say'n.