Odd for God

The basis of this post is due to my fellow pastor/minister, Chris.  His recent devotion challenged my thinking and my life.  His devo, in turn, was inspired by the late Mike Yaconelli, from an article entitled "The Truth Shall Make You Odd."

Once again, I am impressed with the power of peculiarity.  Throughout Scripture we have been branded with oddball status.  Not in a Freak Show sense - though some of us qualify for such (my hand is raised).  We stand out because of God's imprint on us.  We are "aliens and strangers," "a city on a hill," and a "chosen and peculiar people."

God offers this oddball status to everyone, but most aren't takers.  Love me?  Treasure me?  Grace me?  I am all in for that.  But make me odd?  Sorry.  I want to be dull, ordinary and loved.

God's love starts when we are simple folk, just like John Boring next door.  (Actually, I went to school with a guy named John Boring - seriously.  He didn't live next door, however.)  But God's love is a peculiar thing.  It begins to tamper with us.  He loves us as we are, but His love wants to shape us.

The "problem" (when I say "problem," I am adopting the world's view of our status) is that the shape God chooses is His own.  And that shape is not the shape that the world deems normal.  It's like those cultures that revere woman who are. . .  well. . .  big.  Beverly Hills is the not cosmic center for female beauty.  Some cultures consider fat to be beautiful.  In some places, the lighter the skin tone, the more desirable the person.  Beauty might be enhanced by a bone through the nose, or tiny feet, or a schnoz the size of a trolley car.

In the Kingdom of God, beauty defies the world's parameters.  Consider the Kingdom traits that Jesus names in Matthew 5.  These marks are like deforming scars to the world.  But to God they are like that delicate mole above the lip of Cindy Crawford.

"But I don't want to be odd!"

Who does?  I do, however, want to be beautiful in the sight of my Creator and Savior.  In the end, it is His approval that matters most.  And, strangely enough, it is this odd-ness that slowly becomes attractive to the world.  It is not a quirkiness that repels, but a distinction that draws, much as Jesus' character created a compulsion to see who this Man was.

Let's call it oddly beautiful.