Have you ever really just stopped and thought about how creative God is. There are so many crazy things in this world that are simply bizarre. I was reminded of this as I read Jon Acuff’s latest blog post . In one portion of the blog he mentions the Narwhal. “What is a Narwhal?”, I thought you would never ask. The Narwhal is often referred to as the “unicorn of the sea”. Now when I hear this description by first thought is that like the Unicorn, Narwhals don’t really exist and are just a mythical sea creature….WRONG!! (that is meant to be an all caps and exclamation point of excitement, not of belittling because you are wrong) The Narwhal is exactly what you would hope for, it is a whale with a huge Unicorn-like horn coming out of its forehead. This thing is amazing, and its real. 
And God said, “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the vault of the sky.” So God created the great creatures of the sea and every living thing which the water teems and that moves about in it, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. (Gen 1:20-21 NIV)
You know when you are trying to say something, but in the process of getting the words out you are also fighting an inner battle that you have very little chance of winning, the battle against an uncontrollable urge to break out laughing. You know what I’m talking about, your brain calls your whole body to active duty, you are literally tensed up because every single muscle in your body is working to hold back the laugh. And unfortunately you are trying to say something which requires you to open your mouth, which is exactly what the attacking laugh wants you to do. You may get out the words, but at best there are little spurts of the laughs that squeeze through between words. I would like to imagine something like this as God made some of the things he did. Like our fantastically amazing Narwhal. God has created this magnificent horned creature and he looks at it and says “This is good”, but as he’s saying it this uncontrollable laugh is bursting through right with the words. Now I must explain that in this little daydream I’m having of the creation of the Narwhal, God’s uncontrollable laughter isn’t because he is making fun of the Narwhal, or that he doesn’t really believe what he is saying about it being “Good”. Rather I imagine a laughter of gittiness with thoughts of “This is so awesome!”, and “I am so good at this it’s scary.” Seriously, I think He must have had a blast creating everything. …. Are you tracking with me…. maybe not, sometimes I realize that my brain works in peculiar ways and expressing it to others doesn’t translate so well…. oh well. (that italics bit is my version of pulling a Zach Morris)
I think we tend to see things like the Narwhal and our reaction is simply, “thats weird”. I’m not just talking about animals like the Narwhal, Platypus, or those hilarious fainting goats (ok, these are great, i’m putting a fainting goat video at the end of this post). But, we do this with people all of the time, I know I’m guilty of it. We come across someone who may be a little different (I know about 3-7 people immediately popped into your brain…don’t deny it) and they are promptly given the label of “weird“. They aren’t like everyone else, so we assume something must be wrong. Or we feel pity and think “I hope they come out of this soon and become normal like the rest of us.” I for one never stop to think that they aren’t weird, they are unique, and I mean unique in the most respectful way. Many people who we think of as weird are simply being who God created them to be, and I think that brings great glory to the Creator who made them and said “this is good”. We have developed a culture where it is better to be “normal” like everyone else than to truly be your unique self. Thats a little sad. I say we start change this. Let’s take notice of the uniqueness that God has given each of us and embrace it. Let’s take notice of the uniqueness that God has given others and embrace it. If we all did this just think of how much more interesting life would be. So if you take nothing else from my rambling let it be this – Embrace your inner Narwhal and the Narwhals you come across in your life.
Ok, here are the goats.
oakhillscollege 