Homespun Normality
I’ve been devouring Henri J.M. Nouwen’s In the Name of Jesus. It’s a tiny book, but busting with intelligent thought, encouragement and honest spirituality.
Recently while reading, I came upon the term “homespun normality.” It’s a glorious phrase, meant for those that understand down home living, authentic relationship and outrageous love. Homespun normality, or HN, as I’ve come to call it, can make most situations better.
If you’re the one who can bring a little HN to the crowd, you probably don’t even know the power you possess.
- HN takes a serious situation and lightens the load. While it doesn’t make the problem go away, the load just isn’t as heavy.
- HN creates warmth.
- HN invites others into the intimacies of daily living.
I’m going to spend this year, trying to keep homespun normality at the center of my life. For our family, Jesus is homespun normality, friends and family linger in the intimacies of daily life, and comforts of home are intentionally packed to go with us wherever we may roam.
HN is a favorite warm blanket in a hospital room, a worn Bible on a bedside table, the sharing of problems and celebrating victory over a Starbucks, the worst version of the Happy Birthday song sung by the best people and red velvet cake with white frosting on a blue plate. It’s stars and stripes blowing high in the wind and the same flag waving at half mast. It’s the celebration of life ended too soon and the pain of birth. It is the simplest thread and deepest intricacies that keep us bound together in a majestic mosiac.
How do you bring homespun normality to your life and better yet, how will you bring it to others?
Audra Krell 