My daughter Mackenzie went off to Prom at the beginning of May. If you know Mackenzie, she is much more tomboy than girly girl. But the girl was decked out - hair cut; nails and make-up professionally done; big, sparkly jewelry; and an expensive mermaid style, art deco dress in smoky gray and pale pink (thanks to her aunt’s “prom dress fund”). She looked like a Princess.
It’s also how He sees us. Like Mackenzie - I’m no girly girl. But, there are moments where I’d like to be or at least considered so. Times I’d like to start over with who I am. And it makes me consider, what are the names and descriptions we’ve given ourselves? What names have other people or life experiences given us? What limits have those names put on our lives?
God has dealt with this in my life for a couple years now - the process of just making me consider that maybe what I “knew” about myself was a lie took a good year. The week before prom, I picked up Christian author Jo Saxton’s newest book The Dream of You: Let Go of Broken Identities and Live the Life You Were Made For. The title caught my eye because between the summer of 2016 and January of 2017 God started really digging into me through two verses. The first was Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
The second was Psalm 139:14, “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” During those months - when He gave me these verses - God also gave me His calling for me for the years to come and then He showed me how He had been digging up false identities in me and was now working to give me my real identity. But, you know how we like to hold onto things, so I’ve gone through the process in the past year kicking and screaming. But that’s what made me pick up Saxton’s book - I’m a reader, God speaks to me extensively through what I read - and I saw in the title what God has for me.
Actually, what He has for all of us. In the Bible, when God brings new life, He gives people a new name to match that identity: Abram became Abraham, Jacob became Israel, Saul became Paul. In her book Saxton states, “Whoever or whatever has named you does not have the power to define you forever. Are you ready to discover your identity and purpose, your name? Tell God who and what has named you, and who you have become as a result. Invite God to reveal the identity He has given you. This is the name that will give you new life.”
Maybe you already know what these names are or maybe this will take some time - either way, it’s something you pray through and consider and allow God to bring the truth to the forefront. Maybe even listen to those who are close to you and have been telling you for quite awhile the great things they know to be true about you. We have a tendency to underestimate ourselves.
If I can be real with you, I’d like to share some of the names and things that I have allowed to define me over twenty or more years and how they’ve made me into someone I didn’t want to be. They’ve come up from different relational interactions with friends and family, as well as situations and experiences that had profound lasting effects on me. Some are the ways in which I feel people perceived me throughout my life and some are straight up lies I’ve told myself repeatedly. Some may have even been truthful at one time based on lack of maturity, etc:
Bossy, loud, overbearing. Shameful and disappointing. Emotional, difficult, needy. Selfish, not a people person, tries too hard, don’t quite fit in. Not a traveler.
Know what I see in that list now that I didn’t see before? Opportunities for redemption. Weakness that Christ may work through me all the more. Traits that have a positive side if God is with me.
Shame and disappointment? My past is a story of God’s redemption - Him turning my life around, redeeming me, my family, and turning my mistakes into a testimony of His love and faithfulness. With Christ bossy, loud/overbearing, and not quite fitting in become unashamed, bold, and set apart - personality traits God gave me that fit in His recent calling for me and enable me to proclaim Christ to my world. Emotional and tries too hard - issues that, with His spiritual growth, become love and acceptance and advocacy for the people to whom God sends me. Needy and not enough - things in everyone, needed to draw us to Christ and that will help us continue to draw close to Him and which will only be satisfied in Him. Not a people person and not a traveler are straight up lies from the pit...these two lies have held me in a self-enclosed comfort zone that in my past tortured me through anxiety and panic attacks and tried to keep my world small. That last one - staying in a comfort zone - is one I still fight. But fight it I am - in June I’m headed to a four day conference in Indianapolis with women I have only known for about a month. The only way to fight fear is to face it...you cannot conquer what you will not confront.
God has taken the lies of who I’ve thought I was for decades and turned them around. It’s easy to slip back into those identities and grasp at all the old habits that go along with it, but God is there to help you fight them, if you’ll only turn to Him at those moments and ask Him to bear the burden when you can’t.
If you’re tired of living a life “stuck” with yourself, I urge you to invite God to look at your identity with you. To bring forth the lies that have named you and the ways in which they’ve made you someone you’re not. Invite God to reveal who you really are and how that identity serves the purpose He has for you, no matter how long it takes or what it takes. Saxton says - and I agree - “Don’t be afraid if you feel vulnerable when you begin to embrace your new name. It’s an opportunity to lean on God and to rely on His Word and power. He is redeeming your story.” Because when you are living in the identity God has given, you are not stuck and you will only become and feel more and more who you were made to be.
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