Odd Man In

But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light; I Peter 2:9

First of all, we who are Christ-followers are peculiar. There is absolutely nothings cool about being called peculiar, in this world eyes. To God, it is an honor. Notice he lists chosen, royal, holy, and peculiar as definitions of our state of being, and the traits that show the world his marvelous light. Let that sink in. These are all honoring words from God's perspective.

The Bible is full of characters. I mean that word in the old school sense of, just a little offbeat, march to a different drum, kind of people. You see, it is impossible to please God without faith. To start with, our world screams "There is no God," so having faith in nothing is peculiar. We are taught to lay our life down to find it, peculiar psycology in our self-fulfillment world. I think you get the picture.

A lot of talk goes on about peer pressure for teenagers. I am here to say that peer pressure never goes away. We just get bigger and the pressure goes a little more underground. Maybe that is the reason for heartattacks. We internalize our peer pressure as adults to make it look like we don't care we are not...cool. That "I don't want to stand out thing," is just not going to work for you. You now have the God of the universe inhabiting your body/mind/spirit. He's just impossible to tame, not going to happen, too big for the box. Give it up before someone gets hurt.

The chosen, royal,and even priestly words seem to make us comfortable, but the peculiar word is not so appealing. It doesn't mean just nonconformity. It means being a clean reflector of His image. When we live in our royalty, we show forth His praises and live in His light. Celebrating our inheritance makes us unique and yes, peculiar. We follow a different code. We live like our King, our Father, holds all things together. We can live above fear and without confusion. How weird is that?

Let your peculiar Christlike self shine through today.