Finding our Identity

I feel just like this bird sometimes.

He seems a bit confused, yet strangely secure and confident in his confusion.

I have no idea what kind of bird it is, though if you asked him, I doubt he would know either. We snapped this pic at the zoo a few years back because he just seems so different, so bizarre.

If you were to find one of his feathers around, you really wouldn't have any idea what he is either, especially if you found one with only one color. The yellow might be a canary, the red a cardinal, but how could all these colors fit into one bird?

I do feel like this bird sometimes.

Sometimes I am so busy trying to figure out who I am that even I don't really know the answer. For this moment should I play the part of the mom, or the wife, or the daughter, sister or friend? Am I what my job description says I am?

For a long time I saw myself as my profession. I was a trainer and a speaker and a curriculum designer. I was an expert in whatever I taught for the day. I was confident in that title and in that ability.

But as that title shifted I found that confidence wavering again.

Then I pursued my ministerial credentials and wondered should I try to be known as a pastor, or a missionary, or an evangelist or an author?

For many seasons, I have been the mom to infants, and some toddlers, and to school age kids, and to adults and now all of those combined. I have been the home school mom which makes me the teacher, and the hospital mom which made me the caretaker. I have been the sports mom for a few brief seasons but the music mom for many more.

So for a while I saw myself as my role in our family.

But when we are self-employed, those roles merge quite frequently and it's tough to know which ones to prioritize first.

Isn't it simply amazing to know that when our identity is found in Christ, it keeps our lives from being cluttered by all of the shadowing identities that the world tries to force on us?

See, I don't have to be known by my political stance, my denominational beliefs, my family roles, my income or any of the other outrageous expectations that me and the world tend to throw at me.

Because I am simply a sinner who is saved by grace and loved by the Creator of the Universe who wants all things for my good and His glory.

My identity is secure without having to search and without having to label and without having to wonder.

I am simply His. And this is really all I need to be anyway.

Everything else is just the colors of my feathers that make me uniquely His.