~
How do you define yourself?
This was the central question surrounding last night’s talk at Sr. High and it will also be the foundational question for the rest of the month as we tackle the topic of identity.
Identity is a big thing. Who we are, who we try to be, who we want others to think that we are; it all means something. We’re living in a unique time where through the avenues of facebook and other social media we are able to create and hide behind false identities. I call these the idealized version of you. We can choose what interests, hobbies, and photos to show others while hiding or omitting potentially embarrassing or secretive parts of who we are. We can essentially create the best possible version of ourselves that we want others to see. The real interesting question however is do we actually see ourselves this way?
When asked to define yourself, I would imagine it would be a difficult and complex thing to try and answer. However, when pushed I think most of us would give a fairly straightforward and concise definition. “I am a…(fill in the blank).” This definition is what I’m interested in. This definition is what the rest of this month is going to be about. We’ve all got them. One or two or three simple labels that we use to define who we are. Athlete, band geek, conservative, atheist, vegetarian, dancer, gay, christian, pacifist, alcoholic, (blank’s) girlfriend, depressed, and so on… We all do it. We all place these labels on ourselves.
We live in a world that loves labels. It’s much easier to put everything in a neat, easy to understand package than it is to actually get to know somebody. When someone is defined a certain way we are naturally prejudiced in all the stereotypes that go along with whatever label they have. Just play simple word association with any of the above mentioned labels. What do you think of when you hear that somebody is…?
The real problem however, is the way we do this to ourselves. We place labels on who we are and then live our lives within them. We box ourselves in by these labels and apply the same prejudices.
I told a story last night about how growing up in school there was a common theme on all my report cards and in all the parent teacher interviews. “Ben is smart but obviously doesn’t care about school.” Year after year this label was applied to me until I began to buy into it myself. I began to define myself as someone who was “smart but didn’t care about school.” i didn’t put the effort in, I didn’t try to change it, I just went with it. Looking back, that decision had a pretty deep affect on me in the long run. Buying into this definition of who I was has limited me from learning and branching into new things.
When we do this to ourselves, see ourselves a certain way, we put limitations on ourselves that we may not even realize. We begin to view the world through a certain lens. We put limits on our ability to grow, to change, to learn. We put limits on our own creativity.
Do you remember what it was like being a kid? What you wanted to be?
Do you remember the unlimited potential of those dreams? We didn’t worry about the external things that may stand in our way. We just dreamed.
But then life and age and other people begin to knock that dreaming out of us. It knocks the potential out of us. We begin to buy into the limitations that others put on us in their attempts to define us.
Kids have it right though. There’s this beautiful innocence in that kind of dreaming. A beautiful freedom. It’s a freedom that Jesus recognized and commented on. In Matthew 18 Jesus’ followers come to him to solve an argument that they were having in regards to their identities and how they viewed each other. They ask him, “who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” His answer has profound implications for us today. Jesus calls a child over (he loves to use teaching aids) and responds, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
Becoming child-like. Paul picks up this theme as well in Romans 8. “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as children…”
There’s freedom in being a child. Especially in being a child of God. I love that part about fear. Adults are so full of fear. I know that sounds funny but think about it. How often do we just not try something because we are afraid of failure. We lack that unlimited potential in dreaming that children have. It’s freedom. Freedom to grow, freedom to create, freedom to learn, freedom to be loved and not held back by the limitations we put on ourselves.
The rest of this month is going to be picking up on this foundation. The ways in which we define ourselves and holding that against what it means to identify ourselves as being a child of God.
I’m excited. How about you?
