The Curse of Normalcy

I stopped by Imonk the other day and the discussion was on the merits or dismerits of a normal life, or day.  This got me thinking a lot.  Now I don't know what the problem with Imonk these days and I honestly suspect that the problem lies within me, but I just can't keep up. Maybe I think too slow. I visit, a provocative subject is raised. I read the posts. It is hours or days before I have the chance to revisit and presto, there has been four more posts and topics while MY mind is still on the original. Maybe if I had an hour each morning and another one in the afternoon, I could keep up.

But that's exactly what happened in this case. My mind has been going over and over this notion of normalcy for the last two days while Imonk is moved into several more venues.

First of all I know that the old evangelical Mike would say that all Christians are called to the "extra-ordinary life."  I remember arguing with my parents when I first became a Christian at age 18 about this. I was telling them that there is no way I was going to end up like them (I know a bit arrogant and snobbish), going to work at 8 AM, coming home, eating dinner, watching TV and going to bed.  "God wanted us to live lives of victory and spiritual success!" I shouted (please pass the puke bucket and may my dear father, in his grave, forgive me for not respecting what he had done for me by going to work every morning . . .  not to mention going to war).

The more I thought about it this week, the more serious the issue seems to be. I think it is fundamental.

For the first decade after leaving the heart of evangelicalism, I lived in guilt. But that wasn't new because I had lived in guilt as an evangelical so there was no sum loss. But the new guilt was different. For the previous ten years I had been either planning on being a missionary, preparing to be a missionary, raising support as a missionary or . . . actually being a missionary.  Leaving that (especially the romantic life of living in exotic places abroad) and returning to an American 8-5, raising kids, fixing broken down old houses, fixing broken down old cars . . .  I felt like one of the Kardashian girls getting a job at Wendys. I wasn't only guilt-ridden but quite depressed.

What made it even harder was that my best friends from college were all off into "extra-normal lives," as missionaries, Nav staff or getting graduate degrees in theology.

But looking back, the magic life doesn't work, at least not that well. Two of my friends who went on Nav staff went into tailspins in their lives as did two of them who became missionaries.  Those latter two have never adapted to the normal life and have become quite dysfunctional since leaving the mission field. It is sad, just like a football star that gets injured and moves to the stands . . . or the couch for the games. I had a brother-in-law who went from the NFL to the couch very quickly . . . and he has been a lost soul ever since. My evangelical, ex-missionary friends, are living in normalcy while they deeply believe that normalcy is not only inferior . . . but evil.  That creates an intense emotional tension, the same I went through.  The only difference is that I got through mine (no thanks to my own self will, but due to time) while they remain in the dysfunctional wake and I'm doubtful they will ever recover.

But to my point. As they say, "to a hammer, everything looks like a nail." While I admit that potential weakness in myself, I will add that I actually do think much of what ails evangelicalism is philosophical dualism and that is why I created this blog to counter such notions.

So the problem for the evangelical dualist is that they see a sharp division between that which is spiritual and that which is "worldly." Satan reigns in the worldly while God and His angels reign in the high places. In that mindset, the ordinary life clearly falls within the domain of the worldly, thus it can have no value (at least) and it could be pure evil (at worse).

As a Navigator trainee, we were taught that the "ordinary life" was for those who are following the devil and have no purpose . . . and the little church people who didn't love God nearly as much as we did. So, we were to get the little church people with their little, ordinary lives, going to work 8 to 5 in their little ordinary jobs . . . to give us money so we could live these extraordinary lives.

But, I see the universe as the UNI (one) Diversity of everything. Created by God with all its beauty and glory. Yes, it is tainted and broken. Yes, 8-5 jobs are part of the curse of the fall, but the ordinary life is what we are really called to. The getting up at 6, eating cereal, watching the news, pooping, taking a shower, putting on our little ordinary shirts and pants. Driving our ordinary cars to our little ordinary jobs. Coming home, eating dinner. Working on the house or the yard, watching a little TV and going to bed. In my view . . . this is all God's stuff. This is the glorious life and it doesn't have to be "blessed" with pixie dust to have meaning.

In other words, God is in the cornflakes, He's in the sitcom, He's in the songs of the bands . . . or the birds, the smells of the market, the laughter of a friend's voice, the bitterness of the coffee bean, the enchantment of the novelist, the pit of depression in my gut when I reflect on personal losses. No, I'm not a pantheist. These things are not God or a part of God, as His substance. But they are the spin-offs of His creative force. And, they are not dirty or inferior.  The extra-ordinary is a mirage. The seekers there of are taken to disenchantment or delusional thinking, or alienation from reality.

Praise God for normalcy . . . and the ordinary.