In January 2019 before my return to Saint Vincent, my family gave me a traditional farewell dinner filled with my favorite things. Among them krispie creme donuts, pizza, and diet dr. thunder.
Thats right….I said diet dr. thunder!
For those who are unaware, diet dr. thunder is the wal-mart version of diet dr. pepper. I started drinking it after Bible College because you could get a two-liter for 50 cents! Then over time I actually began to enjoy the flavor, and it became one of my favorite drinks.
My family loves to give me grief about liking diet dr. thunder. Especially my brother who when I came from Australia on furlough met me at the airport with a bottle of it in his hand.
But they buy it for me….
because they love me.
All of us have strangeness or quirks in life that other people may look at as strange. It’s easy sometimes to cover those up so that we don’t stand out, or embarrass ourselves. But this is the wrong response because love embraces the strangeness of your life, and even celebrates it! Placing a bottle of off brand soda beside creme filled donuts because you love it.
It is the will of God that the church would have true unity. Unity that finds it’s source in Christ instead of who they are. So unity isn’t about everyone being uniform, it’s about embracing the brother or sister (strangeness and all) because they belong to Christ.
May the Lord help us be confident enough to show our strange side to others, and may they be loving enough to celebrate it.
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