In the Pursuit of Normal

Well, the trash cans that had been used for sick buckets are all back to being trash cans - after a good wash and dousing with Lysol. I look around the house and just don't know where to begin "normal". How much of what I see is normal or a result of sickness and busy-ness?

I posted part of this entry and then I kept thinking about the meaning of Normal.

According to Dictionary.com "normal" is an adjective that means:
1. conforming to the standard or the common type; usual; not abnormal; regular; natural.
2. serving to establish a standard.

This is actually interesting to me. I love learning. I love to dig deeper. A couple of facets of the definition jump out at me.
"Conforming to the standard" and "Serving to establish a standard"
We can't conform to a standard that has not been established.

I am the worlds worst at putting things away. Well, away in their proper homes. I get them close. I have oodles of school work that needs filing - and they're on top of the filing cabinet. Of course, I have this horse in my way so it's often easier to not file than to move the horse and then file only to be interrupted by children. *L*

However, if that is the standard, even if it wasn't meant to be, then that is the standard that my "followers" (aka Children) seek to conform to.

I need to find a standard that is better for us. Possibly a higher standard. What is the standard for my house might not be the standard for my neighbors. I knew someone who's standard was to boycott all things Disney. While she had good reasons, she expected others to conform to those standards as well. She was vocal and rather forceful about it, too. But the standards she set - I did not want to conform to.

I don't want to conform to the world's standards, either. Watching my kids grow up it is ever becoming apparent that they are to be "in the world but not of it". That won't be easy, because it would be so easy to conform to the world's "norm".

God has already set the standard in Jesus and we are trying to conform to it. And even then, there are different levels of "normal" within the churches. Some consider it the norm to pray in tongues - others abhor it. Some consider it the norm to sprinkle and others consider it the norm to "dunk" for baptism.

There are lots of "norms" - but only one Jesus.

I know, too, that there's a depth available to us in Jesus that He wants us to have as "normal". And many of us are just scratching the surface. I don't want to be one who says that I am where I am and that's normal. Like a sunflower that has not reached it's full potential and thinks it's already gotten as tall as is possible.

I want to have the deeper "Normal".

I've become my pursuit of normal -
pursuit of normal for the Laundry Pile and a pursuit of God's normal.
It should be a wild ride.
Because this is not what I wanted to blog about....but that's the kind of normal you get from the Holy Spirit. Gonna be fun.