Identity

A few days ago a conversation developed on my Facebook newsfeed about loving people even when you disagree with them. The phrase “Agreement and acceptance are two very different things” caused a little bit of a reaction, with some suggesting that disagreement about something vital to a persons identity could NOT happen at the same time as acceptance.  Obviously there is a lot of stuff to unfold there, but one of the things that one of my friends took away was the question of what actually does make us who we are? What actually is vital to a person’s identity?

Having gone through a lot of change in the past couple years I found this question particularly intriguing. Some people answered their job, others their personality, still others their beliefs, or some their family, friends, or relationships to others (“Mom” etc).

For me, I have recenlty realised that my job does not define me. I’ve gone through a few different jobs in the past few years, and though some definitely provided more fulfilment than others, I’ve realised that my job does not make me who I am.  Heck, I thought I’d learned this one already but it’s been hitting home even more in the past few days as I got laid off from my job and likely will not be able to get another one until I go on Mat Leave! Even having a job you hate is different than not working for income! Weird feeling! (but I digress).

As for my family, they do not define me either. Yes, they have contributed a lot to who I am, but that is not where my identity comes from. My husband and I are VERY different people. I love him to pieces, but if someone was going to try and guess at who I was by knowing him… I think they’d be surprised. My parents , who I love dearly, OBVIOUSLY had a hand in who I’ve become but they’ve definitely be able to tell you that there are parts of me that they don’t understand at all. My brother, my sister, my nieces and nephews… they all have an impact on who I am, but they don’t MAKE me who I am. Does that make sense?

It’s made even more complicated by the fact that as humans, we always seem to be changing/growing (or at least the capacity is there).

For instance, there is the beliefs factor. Do our beliefs make us who we are? What if your beliefs change? Does that completely change your identity??

Or your dreams/goals? Are THEY what makes you you? What if they change?

Or you could answer our personalities as some people have… and that makes me think of a conversation my family had one about personality traits and I remember my Mom telling my Dad that he MADE himself become more of an extrovert … suggesting that even those are subject to change as well.

So I tried figuring out who I am without all those things, without my job, my family, my beliefs… what am I? How do I define myself?

I started to think maybe my wit. I’m not the smartest person in the world, but I am intelligent, and I definitely rely on my intelligence. I do not know who I am without it. I am a quick learner, and I’m fairly proud of that fact. But then I started to think, what if even that was taken away? I thought of my grandmother, and then wondered if I got Alziehmers, would that change who I am? Would I cease to be me?

No. I would still be the same person who has impacted my friends and family, with the same successes, the same mistakes.

You see, my Mom even got in on the facebook action of trying to define our identity, saying this “We are the sum total to all our experiences, reactions, genetic make up. Our longing, desires. We are also much more than we know. For who really understands themselves.”

And I totally agree with her! But then again, I don’t believe that a person needs to be defined by their past… so I hesitate to put too much weight on how much our experiences define us. And I’ve already mentioned the fact that our longings can change…

So the biggest part I guess I agree with? We are also much more than we know. Maybe all these things that we try to define ourselves with are just not enough. Maybe we are supposed to be getting our identity from somewhere else.*

Maybe who we really are is a big mix of who we’ve been and who we are meant to be. A mix of the present and the potential. And in that I think knowing what God thinks of us is incredibly important to knowing our true identity. Everything else we try to define ourselves by can be so fluid.

For me, I’ve had too many things change in my life to let anybody but God define me. Even myself. But how about you? What do you think makes you you? What if it was taken away? Who would you be then, and how would you know?

*Also… in the course of writing this I thought of the book Searching for God Knows What. If you haven’t read it I seriously suggest it.

Unanswered Questions

I’ve been trying to decide this week if I’m okay with the unknown.

I’m good with not knowing how/when the world’s gonna end. Pre-trib, Post-trib… I don’t care enough to want an answer, especially since there is no way to know for sure anyway. There is no need for me to embrace a “best guess”.

Yet, I’ve noticed over years of blogging that people frequently want to offer answers. You say you don’t know the answer to something? People offer you their answer. You’re going through a hard time – invariably someone is going to offer you a solution. Everyone seems to be in the business of supplying answers. Perhaps because we feel we are supposed to.

It’s like in our culture, we are terrified of admitting “I don’t know” to the world – or maybe just to ourselves.

Just think about it, what’s the most terrifying thing about someone you know going through a hard time? Not knowing what to say to them! Not having answers, not having solutions for them.

As much as I think I’m okay with not having answers to the “big” questions, I have definitely panicked when faced with situations when someone is sharing something with me and I don’t have answers to offer them.

Maybe we all need to learn how to be okay with that.

Maybe when someone is going through a season of pain, or confusion, or anything really, we need to realise that we don’t have to offer them answers.

I mean, maybe sometimes you have something great to offer from experience, and maybe there are times that you are meant to share. But sometimes, even if it’s something you think you have an answer for, it’s an answer they won’t be able to accept until they discover it themselves.

Have you ever had that moment? When you think someone is being blind and completely missing something that seems so obvious and no matter how hard you try you can’t get the answer into their thick skulls?

Maybe it’s not our place to have the answers. Maybe we’re just supposed to be there for people as they go on their own journeys and find their answers.

I’ve always believed that the things people discover on their own are the things that stick with them.

What do you think? Do you always have answers for people? Do people tend to have answers for you??? Does having or being given “answers” work?

Absolute Truth

There are some people who believe that truth is relative. That there is no absolute truth. I’ve thought about this a fair bit. Can’t quite wrap my head around it. For me, not believing in absolute truth is an impossibility. I believe without a doubt that there is such a thing as truth, and yes, right & wrong.

Recently however I have discovered that though I believe in absolute truth, I am INCREDIBLY wary of anyone who claims to know it.

Now, I still believe in the Bible and I still consider myself a Christian. I’ve just been feeling kind of unorthodox lately. It’s always bothered me that there are so many different denominations, and that they all seem to believe they have some sort of corner on the truth. It just doesn’t sit well with me.

Honestly, it almost feels like I’m experiencing a second crisis of faith. If you grew up with Christianity (or any religion I guess), you may be familiar with the fact that no matter what you were told when you were growing up, you reach a point in your life where you have to look at everything critically and decide whether this is something you are truly going to believe or not.

I experienced that as a teenager, and now it seems that I am experiencing it again… In a whole new way.

My father seems to think it’s because I’ve felt rejected and my response to that is to reject those I feel rejected by. I disagree, though I did consider it as a possibility.

More though, I feel like someone pointed out to me “Hey, maybe you don’t belong here” and it has helped me to see that maybe I DON’T. I feel like I am now in the position where I get to evaluate things that I have always accepted as truth but been uncomfortable with and say “Hey, I don’t think I agree with this!”

Who knows, maybe I’ll come around and end up embracing it all again, but at the moment it doesn’t seem like it.

I’m disillusioned with church, disillusioned with 95% of what is called “Christianity”. I am sick of what seems to be an incredibly self-centered, judgemental, and ineffectual club.

It seems that most often when someone enters a church they are offered a culture and list of rules instead of a powerful God.

Don’t get me wrong, I know there are some churches that are different. It just bothers me that I’ve seem more death than life in many of the churches I’ve been to. More judgment and gossip than love and wisdom.

So, right now, I’m on a quest for life. For wisdom, For Love, For more GOD than culture. I believe that Christianity should hold the key to powerful, change-bringing life… And have decided to leave the “box” that I’ve always known it to exist in… Because in the box, it’s seeming pretty dead.

I have a couple quotes that never leave my desktop. One, “Just do the next right thing” the other -

“As long as you, like Abraham, humbly seek, listen and obey God, He’ll take the responsibility to teach you the crucial details, point you towards his Words, and direct you to healthy communities of truth seekers. And slowly, most things will come into focus”

Unfortunately, I no longer remember where I got them from (I think the first is Michael Hyatt the second from the “Frequently Unasked Questions” blog, but I’m not sure).

However, I’m clinging to the truth of the second one. And I’ve definitely noticed that once I stopped limiting where I thought God would show up, he’s showed up in all sorts of places and spoken through all kinds of people. I like having a limitless God who talks through donkeys (Numbers 22) and Angels alike

Searching

It’s been over 6 months since my last post.

The main reason it’s been so long? I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing.

NO IDEA.

Life has definitely handed me a lot of changes in the past six months to a year…

Quitting the ministry, two deaths in the family (My Aunt Jan in September and my Grandma the day after Christmas) moving twice er, three times if we are going with the year time frame. With one more move to come!

Oh yeah, and I’m gonna be a mommy in April.

I’m normally pretty good with change, but I’ll admit, all this has definitely been a stretch for me!

Right now I’m sitting in the Toronto airport, ready to fly back to Thunder Bay… Having just flown back to Southern Ontario for my Grandmothers funeral this Thursday.

I’m TIRED. I am very glad I was able to fly down for the funeral, and grateful for the added bonus of being able to see my husband for a few more days (oh yeah, did I mention that until I go on Mat Leave my husband and I are now living in different cities?) But still. I’m tired. Honestly, I think that whole side of my family is tired, so prayers are appreciated.

I had the honor of speaking at my Grandmothers funeral, and as I was writing my little speechy-thing, I realized that my Grandma was a ripple-maker.

Grandma was what you’d call shy, she was never the centre of attention, she would have hated that – and yet, I know that there are people she made a lasting impact on. Even if you only count her kids, they have her fingerprints all over them! They are all some pretty amazing people, and who they are was impacted by who she was. That’s pretty cool.

It’s an interesting thing to think about, especially now as I am looking forward to being a Mom myself… At a time when, for the most part I’m feeling pretty lost and wondering anew what my purpose is.

Anyway, it’s my hope that for the next couple months as I’m preparing for baby’s arrival and my own move (AGAIN) I will have more time to think some things through. Here’s hoping! If I do, I’ll be sure to keep you guys in the process.

Until then… May your own quest for answers in life be fruitful as well!

Update on the Quest

It’s been almost two months since we left the church we were working at, and it’s been an interesting couple of months. More emotional than eventful, but interesting.

The biggest struggle has been with disappointment. I find myself disappointed in myself, disappointed in others, and disappointed in “church” as a whole.

I spent the first few Sundays after we resigned in bed, enjoying the comfort of my mattress and dreading the idea of ever going back to church.

The dread is slowly ebbing, helped by the church we’ve attended the past few Sundays. I don’t know that there is anything particularly special about it (except maybe for the fact that they still use overheads!) but I feel that it may be a place that I can start to heal – a place that will help me in my journey to find God in a unique way.

Growing up in the churches I did, and then working in churches there was always so much pressure on the way I should do certain things. There was a “right” way and a “wrong” way. What people expected and how I couldn’t disappoint them.

I may be fairly young – though I’m 27 already (yeesh, I remember when 27 year olds had life figured out. ) but it wore me out.

I want the loudest voice I hear to be God’s, and I found that in some situations the more I pursued that the more nervous and uneasy those around me got. I wasn’t even doing anything crazy, they just seemed concerned I would upset the status quo.

Well, now I’m on a quest TO upset the status quo. No one else’s but my own, but still. I’m not pursuing change simply for the sake of change, I’m just so tired of blahness, of feeling like our own personal rules and traditions were more important than God’s will.

So, I’m on a journey to find his will. I have a feeling I’m going to make some mistakes along the way….

Thing is, at this point, I’m kindof excited about the mistakes. Er… Scratch that. They will probably hurt, and I’m not a big fan of pain… but I’m determined to no longer be scared of making them.

I’m going to run out into the wilderness looking for my Daddy-God, and if I happen to scrape my knees on my quest, I hope at the very least my enthusiasm and longing to reach him will warm his heart.

I Quit

Today marks my last day at the church we moved to Thunder Bay to help out at…. I’ m experiencing mixed feelings about it.

Mostly glad, as I definitely believe it was time to move on, a little sad because I am going to miss the people, and, a little scared because I’m back to not knowing what the next step is.

There is a song (by the incredibly cheesily named Superchick) that I have sympathized a lot wiith in the past few months, and I have a feeling are going to continue to resound with me. I’ll share it with you now.

She feels lost in her own life
Treading water just to keep from slipping under
And she wonders if she’s where she’s supposed to be
Tired of trying to do it right
Her dreams are just too far away to see how steps she’s making might be taking her to who she’ll be

And suddenly it isn’t what it used to be
And after all this time it worked out just fine
And suddenly i am where i’m supposed to be
And after all the tears, i was supposed to be here

She feels locked in her own life
Scared of what she might lose
If she moves away from who she was
And she’s afraid of being free
There’s a way she knows is right
And she can’t feel the things she knows and so each step she’s taking
Is a step of faith towards who she’ll be

And suddenly it isn’t what it used to be
And after all this time it worked out just fine
And suddenly i am where i’m supposed to be
And after all the tears, i was supposed to be here

And here where the night is darkest black
She feels the fear
And the light is farthest back
And through her tears
She can see the dawn
Its coming skies will clear
And the light will find her where she’s always been

And suddenly it isn’t what it used to be
And after all this time it worked out just fine
And suddenly i am where i’m supposed to be
And after all the tears, i was supposed to be here

Random Thought: Missing the Point

It seems to me like church is dying. In a general sense. There are still some churches out there that are beating the odds… but for the most part, churches are dying.

People always try to analyze the reason, figure out new programs to introduce, or how they can invite new people, or how the pastor should talk about different stuff in his sermons…

Why do I think we are dying? Because we are missing the point. The most important thing – the POINT of Christianity is being able to live life WITH God. To be able to experience His presence - to be able to follow his leading, to do His will, and not be destroyed by our own selfishness and ignorance.

We’ve missed it though. We talk about what we can do, try to please the people sitting in the pew instead of the one the people in the pew supposedly adore.

Honestly? I think we’ve taken God out of church and replaced Him with people.

Someone was talking about their grandchild today and how they never liked going to church… the more I thought about it, the more I began to wonder… who actually experiences God when they come to church anymore? Sure, those of us who know God, who pray and meet with Him a regular basis, we can “get into” things and have a few “God moments.”

But how long has it been since someone who DIDN’T know God walked into one of our services and was blown away, not by us, but by the all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing God??