at work a few days, i shared that i had seen the film lars and the real girl. curtis asked if i liked it, to which i replied in the affirmative. the conversation then went like this:

“really? it looks weird.”
“weird? you’re weird.” [aside: yes, in typical 7-year-old fashion]
“don’t you think it’s weird…a man who orders a fake girlfriend online and acts like she’s real? jen, come on? [when i did not respond, he added] looks like i hit a sensitive spot.”

to which i simply walked away.
and maybe i should have walked away sooner if i was going to revert back 23 years ago to using reverse insults.
and why was i so sensitive…what did curtis’ response trigger within me?

apparently, i have thought a lot about this comment, thought a lot about why someone would respond as curtis did, thought a lot about why someone would share my sentiment (and sensitivity to both the film and curtis’ response), thought a lot about this film and its relevance to life, and thought a lot about the film’s relevance to theology.

i wonder how i would have responded seven years ago–would i have responded in such black-and-white fashion as curtis (and how he has responded in previous conversations we’ve had)?
quite possibly…
and even would have three, two, or even one year ago (or in similar fashion).

and why? guess we all (or maybe just some) have this concept of normality.
what makes people normal,
what normal people wear,
what actions normal people engage in,
what normal people say,
and how normal people behave.
everything that deviates from this normality appears to be weird. it is not normal, so it must be weird.
normal…it’s that simple.
…or is it?

who determines what is normal?
who delineates the appropriate behavior and appropriate responses to behavior?

i just see differently.
i just don’t see how someone could define what is normal and what is abnormal simply based on some concocted notion of normality (sure, i’ve done my share of weird labeling…and still probably do so i am speaking to myself here as well).

so maybe lars’ behavior is abnormal…maybe normal people don’t order a fake life-sized girlfriend online and make up stories about her. maybe?
and maybe normal people don’t look up images online fantasizing they are reality.
and maybe normal people don’t watch movies to escape their real life.
and maybe normal people don’t read romance novels imagining their man to be like the man they’re reading or their love life to be like what is written in the pages before them.
and maybe normal people don’t drink into oblivion when their life turns sour.
and maybe normal people don’t write songs about how messed up their life is, or how blue they are as a result, in order to bring about some relief, or even some healing.
and maybe normal people don’t ask random people, or those with whom they have some remote association with, to be their friend on facebook.
and maybe normal people don’t share their thoughts, impressions, life experiences, and conversations on a blog for all to see.
and maybe i am not normal…i’m just weird.
and maybe you are too.

what i saw in lars is a man trying to cope with life…in unexpected ways.
lars is having a tough time with life (is that so weird…don’t we all have seasons of life where we struggle with this?).
so he draws in, refusing to engage with the outside world.
he creates an alternative life, imagining his life to be much different than it truly is.
he uses this imagined life to engage with the real world, making him able to cope (somewhat, in his own fashion) with reality.

all this made me think of a recent sermon i heard at church about dealing with our hang-ups…or more aptly titled “healing from hang-ups.”
at the outset of the sermon, the pastor posed the questions:

what do you do when life doesn’t turn out like you imagined it?
what do you do when life gets messy?

the point was made, not just once but repeatedly, that we are all a mess…
that life is messy…
and relationships are messy.

we strive hard to hide our messiness,
we work diligently to mask life’s imperfections,
and we act as if our relationships are packaged nicely with a bow wrapped around them.
we try to hide our messiness…hoping other won’t see it,
hoping that one day we will be able to overcome the messiness spilling out of our lives,
hoping that our relationships will mend themselves.
but why?
is this how it truly is?
if not, what are we trying to hide?

lars tries to hide his messiness as well (as does his brother and sister-in-law) until people in the community accept him as he is–the lady from church mrs. gruner, dagmar the doctor, then others who join.
they go along with his made-up stories of his fake girlfriend,
they allow lars to engage in life as he sees it and as he initiates (without forcing him to be someone he isn’t or do things on their terms or act according to their scripted norms). yet, lars does not realize what the community has done for him. he does not realize how they have accepted him (and his quirky antics), loved him (as he is), welcomed both he and his girlfriend, and even gone along with the imaginative stories he tells. he remains isolated in his mental world of self-pity and isolation until he has the following conversation with karin, his sister-in-law.

Lars Lindstrom: You don’t care.
Karin: We don’t care? We do care!
Lars Lindstrom: No you don’t.
Karin: That is just not true! God! Every person in this town bends over backward to make Bianca feel at home. Why do you think she has so many places to go and so much to do? Huh? Huh? Because of you! Because – all these people – love you! We push her wheelchair. We drive her to work. We drive her home. We wash her. We dress her. We get her up, and put her to bed. We carry her. And she is not petite, Lars. Bianca is a big, big girl! None of this is easy – for any of us – but we do it… Oh! We do it for you! So don’t you dare tell me how we don’t care.

not only do people in our lives make allowances for us, accept us as we are, celebrate us for who we are, love us without condition, and welcome us…so does god.
god does not wait for us to get our stuff together–to fix our lives, the clean up our messiness, to get rid of our fake girlfriend. no, god takes us as we are.
…in fact, god wants us that way.

god grants us grace,
extends us forgiveness,
loves us in ways unimaginable,
celebrates our diversity,
lives with our impurity,
loves our broken pieces,
welcomes us into the community…this community of messy people, who lead messy lives, and who mess up relationships (all the while seeking to be made whole).

god knows we cannot handle this world on our own; god knows we need help. it is for this reason that paul writes,

12 So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! 13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to us all. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.
~paul in 1 corinthians 10.12-13, today’s new living translation.

what good news that god accepts us…
despite our messiness.
despite our hang-ups.
despite our being weird.