Harvesting Healing Through Blogging
True beauty emanates from a woman who boldly and unabashedly knows who she is in Christ.
~ anonymous
An Identity In Crisis
She sits there staring at me… her eyes searching, searching for the woman, the woman who she always wanted to be. Not the girl they want her to be. Her identity is a creation, created by the world that surrounds her. She has learned to be a master of disguise, morphing into the role, the role they created for her. The role she was not and is not meant to be.
She hides behind the veil, peaking through to get a glimpse of the broken world. The fallen world which guides her; forming her opinions and motivating her actions. A world and it’s people who constantly let her down. She is lost, broken. The veil she wears blocks the light, keeps her in the dark.
She lifts her veil, allowing His light to illuminate her flawed self. To wash away her sins. To make her whole. Finally, her true identity is exposed. She is a daughter of Christ.
When I turned fifty, I had my mid-life crisis. My daughters had both moved away, and retirement had come early, leaving me with an emptiness. My husband and I both spent endless hours, alone, stuck in our home due to a health pandemic. The combination of my personal problems with our global crisis did not fare well for me. Our favorite pass-time was consuming alcohol. And, my being seemed to take on a life of it’s own. The result identifying as a troubled woman using alcohol to mask my pain and to deal with the unsettledness of a fallen society.
When my world came crashing down around me I finally took a good hard look at my reflection in the mirror. The woman in the mirror did not recognize the girl looking at her. I had become the girl depicted in the previous story. My identity was in crisis. Did I lose my identity or did I never properly establish my identity to begin with?
I had to put the breaks on, pause; take a good hard look at my life, reflect and discover who I was and who I am meant to be. From birth I was told who I was. Then reality set in. I was not who they said I was and I started comparing myself to others.
My identity told me I was not enough, feeding my insecurities. But I was never meant to be that woman. I needed to learn to love myself unconditionally, as my Father loves me.
As I journeyed through life, I was labeled, placed into categories, evaluated on the human level. A level which strives for perfection. I never actually felt appreciated for what made me individually beautiful, my flaws. I hadn’t fully grown into my identity.
We are beautifully, uniquely crafted by God. He created us with our beautiful imperfections. We are not meant to be perfect, but born of His image. When we place our identity in a rapidly changing world we cannot achieve a secure identity. But when we place our identity in God we know we were fearfully and wonderfully made.
When I take it a step further and say “I found my identity in Jesus” then I can truly accept my flawed self. Of all people, Jesus was condemned and told who He should be. He was steadfast with His identity, born of the image of His Father. He sacrificed for me, atoning for my sins. I was able to forgive myself for my past transgressions, seeking a new identity. An identity which is not without sin, but an identity where I can strive to be the woman God has intended for me to be.
Resources: Christian Identity https://www.cru.org/us/en/train-and-grow/spiritual-growth/core-christian-beliefs/identity-in-christ.html and “What’s an Identity Crisis and Could You Be Having One?” https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/identity-crisis#:~:text=Instead%2C%20here%20are%20the%20signs,or%20your%20role%20in%20society.
“16 So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view. How differently we know him now! 17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”
2 Corinthians 5:16-17
As an imperfect human my growth has been spurred on by a life catastrophe, because I chose to ignore my struggles. Instead of choosing to look inward and identify the source of the problem, which was ME, I placed blame on the society around me. The end result was to numb my discomfort and quell my anxieties with that one glass of wine. By the grace of God I was able to seek forgiveness and unearth my flaws. Through sharing with others I was able to accept my flawed self and learn I did not need to suffer alone. The result peace, from a loving God, not the spirit in the bottle.
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