A pastor friend of mine often says about our ministry: “This is not normal.” Recently, we have been blessed with some noticeable (and abnormal) gifts—a new church property, lots of new faces, and some shockingly generous people. When we look at the blessings, in spite of all our sins, weakness, and flaws, my colleague shakes his head and repeats, “This is not normal.”

That phrase is a good way to describe the Christian faith, isn’t it? When God is willing to listen to run-of-the-mill men and women like us—that’s not normal. When the God who needs nothing to be happy wants us to be with him in his happiness—that’s not normal. When taking care of sin is something Jesus did and not something we do—that’s not normal. When salvation is a gift by grace and through faith and not something we work for—that’s not normal.

Jesus, who knows all your sins, loves you. He likes being with you. He sees you as holy, washed pure by the sacrifice he made on a cross. None of this is normal. But it is so, so good, isn’t it?

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen” (Ephesians 3:20,21).