I wake up and grab my coffee, but the morning is gloomy and life just doesn’t seem to make sense. I rub my eyes all to viciously for this aging skin of mine and yet nothing comes to focus. Some strange voice tries to convince me that I’m a square peg trying to fit into the ever illusive round hole.
Then within minutes I find myself humming the song from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, “we’re on the island of misfit toys.” Where did that come from I wonder?
The island of misfits.
In the movie, the toys who thought they were misfits were all pretty unique.
A Charlie in the Box
A Spotted Elephant
A water Pistol that shoots Jelly
Unique and different, but they couldn’t see that. They are quick to point out why they feel like misfits.
As my mind kept thinking about the misfits that morning, I had to do some googling about that scene in the movie. There were some great insights stumbled upon.
For instance, “Dolly for Sue seems perfectly normal on the outside. Producer Arthur Rankin finally revealed on NPR in 2007 that Dolly considers herself a misfit due to her low self-esteem issues and psychological problems. She’s a doll who feels that she is unlovable.” 10 Things You Didn’t Know About ‘Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer’
We’re all Dolly for Sue’s, right? We package ourselves up all tidy, but really on the inside we feel unloved and unwanted whether we have visible signs of being a misfit or not.
Feel like you’re from the island of misfits?
It’s amazing how fast our minds can send us in to a tail-spin of negativity leaving us floundering around like we are broken and unwanted toys. Obviously it took me all of 30 minutes this dreary morning. I don’t want to be a misfit, you don’t want to be a misfit – we really don’t.
So what do we do? We put on masks and pretend like we’re the cool perfect kids.
The perfect kids and families with no problems. We wear our smiles proudly covering up the real brokenness that leaves us stressed and lonely. We shop for the biggest and best to hide our abuses and hurts. We hide and cover up all that is real within us because we want to fit in.
But then we still don’t fit in because we’re a fake — a fraud.
A church of misfit souls.
Everyone always asks what makes going to church on the inner city so special. Most days I babble on trying to convey the uniqueness and beauty of it. But words just don’t do justice. The inner city most would classify as a land of misfits. But when you’re there it’s beautiful — it’s home.
People walk in the front doors and they are real. There is no pretending — and believe me I can spot a pretender a mile away because I once was a seasoned pretender.
When you greet them it’s as if they know they are a misfit and they assume you are too because you are greeting them. There’s no time for covering up the uniqueness of their situation because all they are longing for is an ounce of hope that Jesus offers. So we laugh together, we cry together, and mostly we pray together and it’s beautiful!
I love them because they allow me to show up as a broken misfit too.
Jon Acuff describes it beautifully in Living Loud in a World Full of Haters (if you want this you need to sign up for the 30 day Hustle before Friday night),
“The island of misfits has the best parties. It has the best community. It has the best relationships. Because there you don’t have to be cool. You just have to be brave. You have to admit you don’t have it all together. That you’re not perfect.”
Enter the misfit King.
We stress and we fret over everything being perfect this season. But what if Christmas is really all about the imperfect?
Does your house have to be perfectly adorned? Jesus was born in a stable.
Do you need to sacrifice your finances to have a great Christmas? Mary and Joseph’s money couldn’t even buy them a night at an inn.
Does this Christmas really need to be all about you? Jesus left the dazzling brilliance of heaven to serve others.
The misfit King. He definitely didn’t fit in. Others mocked him because He was the King, yet nothing about him was stately or pomp.
Listen in to this encouraging message Infant Lowly. [powerpress] Email friends, click here.
Misfit King comes to save the misfits.
King Jesus didn’t come to impress us, but came to free us, the misfits. He never once thought about how his lowly birth would look or what others would think. He simply wanted to implore our hearts, change a world, and offer us grace.
Looking at the lowly babe there in the stinky, smelly, dirty stable I’m reminded that the misfit King came for . . .
the broken
the hard-hearted
the shameful
the unforgiven
the angry
the prideful
the lustful
the abandoned . . .
the misfit.
This season let’s be comfortable being misfits.
How can you get off the island of misfit toys and make a difference to other misfits?