Are You Quite Normal?

For being a disciple of Jesus, people may regard you as not being quite normal.

But what is ”normal”? In relation to what?

It could be many things, like eating breakfast in the morning, working during the day, watching the news in the evening, and sleeping at night. In that respect a disciple of Jesus wouldn’t necessarily stick out from the crowd and could be considered quite normal.

Yet, let’s think of some other more subtle aspects of life. Like for instance, our values, our fears and our desire for security.

It could be considered normal to not want to associate with certain kinds of people, like people from a different stratum of life than ours - the poor, the homeless, the foreigners, the social outcasts, those from another religious group, those who don’t share the same political views like us etc.

We usually don’t want to get involved with someone too different from ourselves. Or with someone in great need. We feel they will lower our level of happiness, security and comfort.

Yes, that’s absolutely normal!

It is normal to play it safe. It is normal to prefer the well-known and well-proven solutions instead of trying the new and unexplored ones. It is normal to avoid the unpredictable and the risky. It may even be considered normal to keep God out of the picture.

It is normal to follow the crowd.

Jesus wouldn’t fit in that sort of normality. He was anything but normal.

And as his follower, neither are you.