Welcome to my series on Identity where together we will explore how to find Identity in who God created us to be and how to have a strong Self Confidence and rely on God to define us.

We often ask ourselves the questions “Why am I here?”, “What is my purpose?”, “What’s the point?”, and many other introspective questions. Life is confusing and messy and leaves us flailing about, confused and lost. We don’t know who we are or where we are going. Often we feel as though life is passing us by and we are just left to follow the current. Why do we struggle so much with finding a purpose and meaning in life? We doubt the reason for our existence and we end up doubting God.

Jesus tells us in John 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” The thief in reference here is Satan. Let’s read Genesis 3:1-7.

The Fall

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”

The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’ ”

“You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

Did you catch the first sentence, the serpent is crafty. Did you also notice the method he used to get her to disobey God? He’s crafty so instead of blatantly telling her what would happen, he wormed his way around the subject. He caused her to doubt the Goodness of God. He sowed a little seed of doubt, that maybe God was holding back and not telling the full truth. So how does this story apply to this topic of identity and purpose? Did you notice that the first thing they did after their eyes were open was put clothes on? They were insecure about their nakedness! Haha if that isn’t the most realest thing ever. How appropriate to today’s topic of identity. It all goes back to John 10:10, the thief’s purpose is to steal, kill and destroy. He steals our happiness and makes us doubt the Goodness of God. He makes us doubt our purpose and meaning on earth. 

He sows seeds of discontentment within ourselves; “I don’t like my body’, “I’m no good at sports”, “I think I’m in the wrong body”, “I’m too dumb to learn”, “I’ll never be good enough for them”. It’s the little lies he feeds us to keep us from being happy with who we are. With some it can cause them to doubt their meaning and purpose in life to the point where they take their own life; thus he kills. Even if it never gets to the point where one takes their own life, he still kills your zest for life, he kills your joy. Ultimately his entire goal is to eradicate the Christian faith and take over the world.

Many people have an identity crisis somewhere around their senior year of high school and their freshman year of college, because all their life they’ve only known what they’ve been told about themselves by their parents, teachers, or friends, now all of a sudden they have to make a decision that will alter the course of their life and they don’t have enough self confidence or self identity to know who they are and what they want. 

I struggled with this my senior year to the point where I got so depressed and lost that I finally had to give up control over my life and lay it all down at his feet.  The only thing I knew about myself and that I was confident in, was that I loved to dance. It had become my identity. I’d introduce myself and my number one attribute I’d use was I am a dancer. What I had to discover and what I am still struggling with is who I am without dance. Every evening I was in the dance studio. I dedicated all of my thoughts and energy toward dance. There was just one problem, I was facing the end of my dance career with no direction to go. I thought I knew I was too fat and not good enough to pursue dance professionally, not to mention my personal faith contradicts working on the Sabbath which is every show day ever for every company. So I knew a professional career was not an option. Not to mention I got rejected out of the dance program of my school of choice because I was “ too advanced for their program”

I also thought I wasn’t good enough to be a teacher. I didn’t have the guts to tell kids corrections and I certainly didn’t know the first thing about choreographing. I certainly knew I couldn’t just keep taking dance classes forever. I had to come up with some kind of career. The only other thing I knew about myself was that I am really good at reading, I loved to read. I also knew that I loved kids, of all ages. So what does reading and kids have in common? School! I thought becoming a school teacher for elementary school would be the course to take. But what I didn’t realize is that as much as I loved those two things, combining them and making it a career was a sure fire way to make me hate them. 

After a full year of college I finally came to the conclusion that this was not the right course for me. But what in the world was?! I liked to sketch floor plans of houses, maybe I could be a drafter, but that takes math and I hate math. After a long time of prayer and some counseling, I came to the conclusion that I would just stick to dance and figure out the rest later. Little did I know what God had in store for me because I ended up with a job that I never would have dreamed of but that is perfect for me. 

A lot of high school athletes have the same struggles, our passions become our identity. But who are we really without that? Who are you?

I can tell you who you are. Not to me, not to your parents, not to your friends, not to your teachers, but I can tell you who you are to God. Once you discover who you are, then we can begin to unwrap why you are here.