Identity

John 3:30

"He must become greater; I must become less" (NIV).

"He must increase, but I must decrease" (ASV).

"This is the assigned moment for him to move into the center, while I slip off to the sidelines" 

(The Message).

The Lord has been really working in my heart on where I find my identity.  One of my focuses while coming to Kenya was to strip myself of any self definition that is not of the Lord.  I have been realizing over the past year that much of the way I define myself is by what I do.  Like “good student, musician, athlete.”  And though these titles were and are hard to let go of, I would say it is even harder to part with the ‘how I am’ aspects of my identity.  In being known as kind, caring, sociable, well-liked.  These too are things which I must not find identity in alone.  If I hold on to any view of myself too tightly it will affect me when I feel that idea being threatened.  I am not independently anything apart from the Lord.  Anything I think I am is a perception from others or circumstantially based on current experiences.  It is a reflection of the way others make me feel.  This is not to say that affirmations from others are bad, but they are not the sole truth.  We are more complexed than that.  At any point in my life I have been funny, angry, well-liked, loving, hostile, gracious, annoying, a good friend, a bad friend, proud, understanding, stubborn, patient.  Though I hope to grow more and more towards good qualities and away from negativity, none of those qualities define me.  Of course I have an identity.  The Lord made me a certain way and I have experienced certain things.  However, I have to remember the root of this identity.  It is dangerous not to.  Evil arises when this identity is threatened if I am holding onto it to tightly.  When you think about it, this is how much conflict arises.  Someone else threatens my sense of being by either saying something different than what I would like or rivaling me for the thing that I take pride in.  However, if I do not find my identity in these things than I can no longer be disheartened or threatened by them.  I can allow Jesus’ character to shine through me more because I am less worried about my own.  And when we allow Jesus’ character to override our human nature, I believe we become more of the person we were meant to be in the first place.  We become more confident in who we are when we lose the idea of who we have to be. 

"I tell you the truth, unless a kernal of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed.  But if it dies, it produces many seeds.  The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life" (John 12:24-25).