I'm not normal.

I'm not normal.

If you're a regular reader around here you probably know that already.
"Normal" is what conforms to our culture. Our culture does not recognize Jesus as Lord; it has warped ideas of marriage, family, and sexuality; it encourages us to spend what we want when we want regardless of our income.
By that standard, I am very abnormal.

• I am a follower of Jesus in a world that hates--and sometimes, what is often worse, ignores--him.
• I am committed to honor, respect and even submit to my husband, Biblically, as the Church submits to Christ (aka, place myself under his loving care and leadership, not become a doormat).
• I am a homemaker and proud of it. I do not seek validation from a conventional career, although I do also work outside the home.
• I and my husband plan to homeschool our children as we were also educated at home, and feel that as future parents it would be best for us to be the primary influence in our future children's lives (radical, huh?).
• I and my husband gladly and frugally live within our means and don't have any credit card debt. We rent an apartment (for now), drive a used car, and don't spend more than we make.
• I believe in Biblical femininity--in embracing my God-given role as a woman.
• I believe that sex is an amazing gift of God, designed to be enjoyed within a marriage by a husband and wife (one man and one woman).
• I strive to avoid eating and cooking with processed foods, and cleaning with natural, inexpensive products.

(See all the links in the text above? Click on those to read more in-depth posts I've written on those topics.)

Paul wrote to the Romans, "Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will." (Romans 12:1-2)

Jesus said to his disciples (which includes believers who follow him), "If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. " (John 15:18-19)

Paul wrote to the Corinthians, "For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." (2 Corinthians 10:3-6)

Peter wrote, "Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul." (1 Peter 2:11)

Scripture itself tells me that I'm not "normal" by the world's standards. I am not to conform to the pattern of the world; I do not belong to the word; I do not fight with the weapons of the world; I am, in fact, an alien and stranger in the world.

I am a child of God: heaven is my eternal home, and therefore I live my life with an eternal perspective--this life is not all there is.

So, no, I'm not normal. And that's just how it should be.