What is Identity All About?
Have you ever had a singular concept come up again and again? Sometimes it’s not a concept, but a verse. Usually I take these times as God’s way of slapping me in the face - not in a mean way but a, “Hey! Look at this!” kinda moment.
Over the past two weeks the idea of identity came up again and again.
Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary says that identity is the distinguishing characteristic or personality of an individual. That sounds like a lot of gobbly-goop to me. Rephrased, in a normal way, is ‘the things about people that make them who they are’.
Sounds pretty simple. Buf if you type ‘blogs on identity’ into your Google search window you will find SO MANY results. I’m going to come at this from a different perspective though. I want you to think about your identity with Jesus. I am the Blessed Mum afterall!
So what made this week so focused on identity?
On Monday night I posed a very reasonable question to our church family at Small Group. I was the fill-in facilitator so I was really just reading the questions on the page.
Do you feel pressured to say “yes” to every good thing or opportunity?
Hmm. Do I feel pressured to say “yes”?
Uh, yeah, I do. Rewind a couple of years to our previous church in Maryland. I’m the one who used to sign up for volunteering in the kids church every week when I saw a ‘Need’.
What started out as my way of helping where I saw a physical need quickly turned into feeling that this was who I was. I would tell myself that I was a good volunteer. I remember thinking, ‘Well, I don’t work during the week so I can do this on Sundays.’ It took our pastor telling me that there were others who could serve, and I didn’t need to do it every week.
Today I have a healthy boundary set for myself. I serve with the kids twice a month. The other Sundays are for me to get poured into. I love Worship time - singing along with the praise team is special for me. Listening to the message from our pastor - with no distractions - is a gift. The fact that I can have this balance makes my time with the two and three-year-olds all the more beautiful too. This past Sunday with the kids left me feeling happy, and the lesson was on obedience. I guess two and three year olds put a different spin on that concept. 😀
So how does this relate to IDENTITY?
When I start to identify as a volunteer for the preschool ministry, I am totally missing the way-bigger picture. My ‘doing’ moments do not show my IDENTITY.
I am a beloved daughter of God!
I am loved and forgiven by Jesus!
I am a student through the Holy Spirit’s prompting!
I am an image bearer of our Triune God!
I can downplay my identity like no other.
My identity in Christ is way cooler than anything else.
The face-slapping continued…
On Tuesday morning I had MOPS. They have rebrand themselves as The MomCo - check it out here.
Anyways, the Coordinator and I had agreed on watching The Power of Naming with Jess Connolly. I actually watched the video twice because I had to see what it was all about before we shared with the other moms. Well, Jess dove into Genesis and the translations of the Hebrew words used to describe God’s creations. She focused on the Greek word ‘towb’ for the first five days of Creation - the days when God made the sun, land, skies and oceans, sea creatures and land creatures. This term means good, pleasant, or agreeable. Then, after God created people, the word ‘meod’ comes in. This means ‘muchness’.
So there, in the beginning of the Bible, we are able to read that God created people to be more than good, but very good.
Instead of looking at a career or family role or what my weight is that morning, I can focus on the fact that God made me - and all of us - to be characterized as a very good creation from the beginning.
Later that day, with my head still thinking about how God used His Words to create us, I got a text from a friend at Church. She wanted to bring me with her to a class to hear Putty Putman speak. Well, yes. Yes, I wanted to go.
I already told you that I struggle with saying no to any good opportunity.
But, it was Cub Scouts night.
Other mamas, you can insert literally anything here.
But, it was swim lesson night.
But, it was choir practice night.
But, it was basketball night.
But, it was karate night.
ALL OF THESE ARE GOOD THINGS TO DO WITH OUR KIDS!
Here’s another ‘but’ for ya’... but my husband was home.
Am I the only mum who feels like she has to be at all of her kids’ events?
Am I the only mum who feels like she can’t ask her husband - the father of her children - to take the reins sometimes?!
These are just silly thoughts. I know they are. Logically, anyways. Yet at that moment I felt that I must be there for the boys. And I would argue that I felt that way (and most likely will again) because I have begun to see my identity so completely in motherhood.
Motherhood is beautiful and such a blessing!
Motherhood is not my identity.
My eyes kind of bugged out of my head as I wrote that.
Insight into what is literally going through my mind right now -
What?! Motherhood is totally my identity. I changed my identity from ‘High School English Teacher’ to ‘Mother’ seven years ago. That has pretty much been the basis of my life for the past seven years.
Okay, now I am gonna jump back out of my head because I can’t type all of the things that fly around in there on a minute-by-minute basis. My mind definitely needs some re-working because I know you just read that God made me ‘tov meod’ (check out this linked article I found) from the beginning.
So, I asked my husband if he could take both of our boys to Cub Scouts. And he said YES! There was some (sort of) fake crying over having to do bedtime too, and that was that.
So what is Identity for Christians?
Here’s the big point. What is the identity of someone who claims to be a Christian?
When Putty Putman started speaking, he went back to Genesis - just like I had heard earlier in the day through the Jess Connolly video. I was again shown what identity was, and this time from a different perspective. Putty’s teaching was different from Jess Connolly’s video on The Power of Naming. He was about to change my way of thinking about humanity.
If you have a Bible around, go get it! Open to Genesis 2.
…waiting for you to go do that. 😉
So in Genesis 1 it says, “And God said,” six times. But the description of the creation of mankind does not follow that same format. The first five days of creating use the act of speaking beautiful things into creation.
In Genesis 2 it goes even deeper into the moment when God actually made man. It says,
“Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."
Genesis 2:7
He - God - broke the pattern of speaking creation into being. With us, God used His hands to fashion us!
So God used His voice to create AMAZING THINGS! He used His voice to create the sun, the sky, the seas, the plants, the stars, the sea creatures, the animals.
Yet when it came to humanity, God used His hands down in the soil and His own breath.
Just sit and think on that notion for a minute.
What if your identity could be based in the fact that God fashioned humanity - YOU - with his own loving, capable hands?
Why is Identity Important?
It is so easy for you to get stuck in the cycle of creating your identity. You may base your identity around your job - I did that for years. But then what do you do when that job changes or you have to leave it? You may also base you identity on your role within your family. But then what do you do when your marriage falls apart? Or when your kids no longer need you? Who are you then?
Identity politics, or at least that terminology, came forward in the 1970s. In an effort to understand people, it is so very helpful to see:
Gender
Race
Ethnicity
Socio-economic status
It is important for government leaders, schools, and communities to see and understand these parts of their people. Social programs benefit from understanding the needs of the people who will use them. Schools need to see their students if they want to teach them effectively. Groups of people can cooperate and serve one another best when there is at least a basic awareness of one another.
But I see a greater need than focusing on these outward indicators for identity.
When you can look outside of yourself - and look to the beautiful truth of your identity with Christ - your life can change. No matter what your gender, race, ethnicity, financial situation, job, familial set-up… you can rely on the truth that God fashioned you in your mother’s womb (Psalm 139:13-14) to be a very good part of this world. Make that your new identity.
So what should you do with these ideas on identity now?
Hopefully you feel inspired to think on this some more. I have ordered a couple of journals on Amazon for the sole purpose of having a set place to meditate on scripture and my questions that come from it. Check some journal options out here.
You might be the type of person who needs to talk about things out loud. I know sending Marco Polos to friends from afar has been helpful for me. But even better, just ask your partner or a good friend (who you can grab coffee or tea with) what they think. Talking through these kinds of ideas can be kind of hard, but doing that with someone who you love and respect can be a good place to start.
Is your identity caught in a negative self-talk loop? Maybe you struggle with body image like I do. Check out this book, Breaking Free from Body Shame by Jess Connolly. I really enjoyed hearing her at MOPS last month.
You want to see who this guy Putty Putman is and what he has to say about identity for Christians? Check out his books on Amazon here. He has a bunch of videos on YouTube and a website as well.
Really, I just hope you feel blessed by these words.