How Do You Do Life “Not Normal”?

By Beccy Riley

Today I did something outside of my comfort zone. 

If you’re anything like me, you have a deep longing to be living a wild adventure, full of crazy stories, mad peril and fabulous happy endings. An out of the ordinary different life that is unique and inspiring and means something.  Yet often I find myself in the ordinary.  Doing the school run, paying the bills, washing the clothes, making the dinner, feeling very…. Well… normal.

Normal has always equated to boring to me.  I always said as a teenager that I didn’t want to have a normal boring life! I didn’t want to be like everyone else.!! But now with 2 kids and another due in a few weeks, in the day to day, normal can become easy.  It can become routine and it can become safe. In some ways normal is both compelling and repugnant to me in equal measures. 

Those moments when I just start to feel a bit bored again is when I feel God speak back to me…. ” I don’t want to live a boring normal life. I don’t want to be like everyone else.”

I know then that something needs to happen.  That I need to make something happen.  That I need to step up to who I was born to be and stop hiding in the normal.

It’s so tempting to hide, to be someone you’re not actually created to be because it seems easier and less scary and you don’t actually know what might happen if you embrace what’s in you and what might come out of you.  It’s tempting to settle when you’re not quite sure how to start to be yourself and how to live beyond yourself on a wild adventure.

I hid for a while, when I embarked on motherhood and I didn’t have a clue how to do it all.  Didn’t know how to put all the pieces together.  But it’s very true what Jesus says, “Use it or loose it”, and for a while I lost my confidence.

But I keep hearing God echo back to me my own words… “I don’t want to live a boring normal life.  I don’t want to be like everyone else.”

“God how do I do this?” I would say.  How do I live the life I know that you’ve designed me for when I am married with kids? Little kids!

But that’s the beauty. I have been able to meet so many more people since having kids than before! It’s like you are entering into a whole new world, you get a pass into a secret club you never knew existed before, called the I have kids club!

With these new connections comes a whole new world of possibilities to live beyond yourself.

Today I did something out my comfort zone.

Two weeks ago we took the kids on mission with us for the weekend to Cork.

My husband and I are National Directors for a missions organisation called Pais.

We decided to take the kids away with us so that we could all be involved in this mission together. I love that. We were there one day handing out “Because You’re Loved” cards with lollypops to strangers in the street and offering prayer. I got to pray with several wonderful people in the middle of Cork city as they were going about their business and I saw a change in their eyes as I invited the Holy Spirit onto them and into their circumstances. It was wonderful.  It was wonderful to see my boys aged 5 and 4 be a part of this experience and see it as this is what we do.  I was energised by doing this and really felt like this is the kind of life I am meant for.

But it was today I really stepped out of my comfort zone.

I was at a party for my 5 year old son’s friend.  All the parents stayed and we had a lovely afternoon.  I got chatting to one mum who was telling me about her Crohn’s disease and how bad it was and how she was on 40 tablets a day. She was sharing about how it has given her terrible mouth ulcers and how even with injecting herself each week at home and even with all this medication, it’s still not under control. 

Inside me, I was thinking…. I know I have the answer right here…. I know I can offer her Jesus…. This is a risk…. This is someone I have to see every day…. She’s going to think I’m mad…. She’s going to hate it…. She’s going to not like me…. Etc etc.  As we were talking my heart began to beat a little faster and I was reminded of my words.. “I don’t want to live a boring normal life…” I knew that I needed to offer her prayer and Jesus.

So I did.  

I asked if she had considered prayer and if I could pray for her.

What do you think happened?

She said, “You can if you want. I’m willing for you to give it a try, it can’t hurt.”

I wanted!  But she really didn’t think it would work.  So I prayed with this wonderful woman sitting at the table in the middle of this party. I asked her if there was any change in the mouth ulcers. There wasn’t.  With a bit of fear, I said I would pray one more time and then I will leave her alone. I prayed again, a little bolder this time. I asked fearfully again, “any change?” She said, “well actually the ulcer that was sore doesn’t really hurt any more!” She also said that she has blood tests every 4 weeks so will be able to see if there is any change in the Crohn’s disease soon.

She opened her life story to me including her pain with loosing her faith and how she felt she might possibly get it back one day.  We had a great conversation where I got to share Jesus’ love for her and how he was pursuing her.

Was it as bad as I dreaded?

NO!
Did it feel as exciting as I hoped?

YES!

As we got into the car to drive home I said to my husband WOW! He said – “good party?” I said – ”Yes, but it was AMAZING to share Jesus with my friends!”

How do you do ministry and kids? How do you do life “not normal”? You connect with the people around you listen to their pain and hurting and you bring the life and love of Jesus right there.

There is nothing boring about that.  There is nothing normal about that.

Is it easy? Not always, but whoever said that a wild crazy adventure was easy?

It’s the life I was born for and I know that it can also be the adventure for EVERYONE who is willing to say, “OK, Jesus, I’m going to give it a go!”