I remember the days when, like an overworked octopus at a costume party, I stretched my arms in every direction – trying desperately to fit in, blend, and occasionally brush elbows with the “cool kids.” I smiled when I wanted to sigh, laughed when I wanted to leave, and nodded at nonsense as though I were fluent in it. Yet even in the hive, where conformity buzzed like a national anthem, my mind danced to its own strange rhythm – off-beat, off-script, and occasionally off-putting to those around me.
The “normal” things everyone seemed to worship – the gossip, the trends, the unspoken rule that thinking too deeply was social suicide – felt to me like eating soup with a fork: pointless, messy, and utterly exhausting. I found the customs of the crowd either suspicious or downright repulsive, like sugarcoating spoiled fruit and calling it dessert.
Then came 2020—the year the world turned upside down and, ironically, I found my footing. The Most High, in His unmatched sense of timing, plucked me from the crowd and lit a candle in my cluttered mind. He showed me who I am (Deuteronomy 28), to whom I belong, my true heritage (Ecclesiasticus 17:11), and how to please Him – not man. Hosea 4:6 echoed like a divine alarm clock: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” And there I was, blinking awake, realizing that God had poured His wisdom into my once empty skull – knowledge that no degree or denomination had ever offered.
Now, I reside on the peculiar side of life – the “weird” lane. The lane where people actually obey the Bible instead of explaining why a commandment doesn’t apply “in these modern times.” Let me tell you, it’s peaceful here. Every time someone squints at me like I’ve just confessed to eating cereal with a fork and mutters, “you’re weird,” I mentally high-five Matthew 7:13–14. It reminds me that the road to destruction is a six-lane highway – wide, popular, and full of spiritual traffic jams – while the road to life is a narrow trail, barely wide enough for one truth-seeker and a backpack of conviction to walk on.
Let’s talk about that word strait in the verse mentioned earlier. Its root, yashar, means to be straight, level, lawful, or just – essentially the opposite of society’s moral spaghetti. Scripture tightens the definition in 2 Esdras 7:21: “For God hath given strait commandment to such as came, what they should do to live…” So, the “strait gate” isn’t about squeezing through some divine doorway – it’s about aligning one’s life with the commandments that most people scroll past like terms and conditions they’ll never read.
Christ Himself said few would find this path. And now, I understand why. Of course, my old pastor said the laws were “done away with.” Of course, he claimed Christ had fulfilled them so we could rest easy in disobedience. After all, the wide gate has better lighting, catchy music, and a bigger crowd -it’s practically a festival of false comfort.
But obedience, true obedience, was never meant to be fashionable. Christ warned us in Luke 14:26 and Matthew 10:22 that His followers would be hated for His name’s sake. Obedience disrupts comfort. It challenges culture. Whether it’s our women trading their pants for modesty (Deuteronomy 22:5; Exodus 28:42), our households following the dietary laws of Leviticus 11, or our men proudly wearing their fringes and beards while keeping the High Holy Days – every act of obedience is a silent protest against the world’s lie that God’s commandments can’t be kept. And so, here I am – happily weird, joyfully misaligned with the masses, walking the narrow path that feels less like restriction and more like freedom. The kind of freedom only found when you stop trying to fit in – and start fitting into His will.
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