I never really realized how much I liked my name until I got on this trip. I also never realized how hard it is to say in some parts of the world. How the sounds I am so used to hearing sound so foreign to someone else. I also never realized how much of my identity is wrapped up in my name. I mean honestly, your name is who you are, how you are identified to the world. So what happens when you are suddenly forced to respond to something other than what you have been called for 26 years?
As you may or may not know, the first week of this month I spent laid up in bed with a fever. So while my team was meeting everyone, giving introductions, getting aquatinted with the ministry, I was alone in a room trying to figure out if I was hot or cold and what my body was doing. When I was finally able to start ministry with my team one of the pastors who was working with us had decided my name was no longer Karen. Ok maybe "decided" is the wrong word. Maybe he understood my name to be something different. Regardless to this day he is still calling me "Kelen" ( like Helen, with a K) And unlike "Korean" last month, which I thought was endearing, this name drives me nuts! This name makes me feel unknown. It was bad enough that I was a week behind my team in getting into the ministry, and that I am still having to make trips to the hospital almost daily which pulls me away from more ministry. Now I am having to figure out who "Kelen" is too. I honestly felt like I had to come up with a different identity this month. I didn't know who I was suppose to be. I kept asking God why this name bothered me so much. He was the one who confirmed it made me feel unknown, like a lesser person, because this person hasn't taken the time to get to know me enough to know my real name. But then he reminded me that he still knew my name. He knew who I was. His plan for me hadn't changed just because someone was calling me by a different name. He said it shouldn't bother me that much, because the one person who mattered knew me.
That sneaky God… He always has a way of making me feel better!
