So this is the blog that I’ve been nervous about posting. It’s the post about a major challenge I’ve always faced and still haven’t broken free from. I didn’t know it was such a huge problem until I watched the sermon by Mark Driscoll last week. This is number one of the five categories of idols that I struggle with. It’s the main category that I’m prone to try to find my identity in, rather than Jesus.
I am _________. Insert: a job, skill, hobby, family role, awesome adjective, relationship status, age, etc.
“If your identity is in your duty, you try to find ‘your thing.’ Found my ‘thing,’ now I want to become really good at my ‘thing.’ And if you achieve it, you kind of become smug. And if you don’t, you become depressed.” -(Quotes from Pastor Mark Driscoll)
Your “thing” is something you’re good at. Being artsy, athletic, smart, musical, good at cooking, a career or a hobby, etc.
“It may not even be that you’re doing the wrong thing. You’re doing the right thing with the wrong heart.”
Current issues for me:
- I want to do everything. I’ve always been that way. When I was younger, I switched my answer to the “what do you want to be when you grow up” question often. I usually answered an actress, veterinarian, artist, fashion designer, or power ranger.
- My “thing” is something that I try SO hard to find. I want a “thing” more than I can explain. I don’t know why it’s so important to me, but I just want to be good at something. Remembered for something. Known for something. I’ve tried so many “things” to find mine…
- Sometimes, I feel like I am nothing special. Satan knows that this is an area I struggle with, so he puts this lie into my mind. As far as skills and hobbies go, there isn’t too much to me. There are just a million things that I can’t do. And I don’t like that.
- I’m always comparing myself to other people who know who they are, have something they are doing with their life or have a “thing” that they are extremely talented in.
How God is helping me eliminate these issues:
- God is helping me realize that I can’t do everything and that is just fine. I need to step back from trying to be so many things and be good at so many things. He placed certain strengths in me, and I just have to discover them, embrace them and use them to glorify Him. He is in the process of revealing my strengths to me.
- As far as “what I’m going to be when I grow up” God is telling me to wait. He has plans for me after the race that I can’t imagine. I am not making any plans at all. I want to do what God wants me to do.
Right now, I am a missionary ( it still blows my mind to say that. It’s the one “thing” I never considered. How ironic how God works).
- God keeps telling me that I am special. I want to believe it without a doubt and not allow Satan to tell me otherwise. God will reveal my abilities, gifts, talents and strengths when it is time. He has been doing so slowly.
- Passions are placed in our hearts for a reason. God has given me a passion for children. That is why I considered teaching, but maybe He has other plans in mind. I also have a passion to learn guitar. I don’t know if that is the “thing” He has for me, but He placed that desire in my heart and wants me to use it to glorify HIM.
Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the derires of your heart. -Psalm 37:4
I need to delight only in God and not search for delight in other things or try and make my own happiness.
- Comparison is another issue in the “others” category which I will write about more in my next blog entry. But I know that I will compare less once I feel comfortable in myself and who I am in Christ. I can’t wait to be there.
“Who you are determines what you do NOT what you do determines who you are.”
“Come to Jesus, be born again, become a new you, and then who you are determines what you do.”
