You Can’t Hide Who You Are 4 – Sense of Identity

When I was a kid once a year the Lubbock County Fair would be held in the Fall.  I would save some mowing money to get in the fair and play some games and have some cotton candy.  I always loved going to the fair and just hanging out and having some fun.  Every year there was a fun house.  It had moving floors ladders to climb and a rolling barrel to walk through.  The best thing in there were the funhouse mirrors.  They were made to distort what you saw when you stood in front of them.  As kids we would laugh at each other’s reflections.

What was reflected back was you, just not a true and honest picture of who you are.  It would give you a big butt or head; maybe even distort your height.  It changed it enough that it was funny to see and we all had a blast laughing at our reflections.  Distortion was a great thing when you gazed into those mirrors.  Thing is about those mirrors I never walked away thinking that it was a true picture of who I was.  I knew that it was a funhouse mirror and my head or butt were not really that big.

I just wonder sometimes what we see when we look in the mirror above the sink in the morning?  What is the image we imagine looking back at us?  Sure, we may see more bags and grey hair than we like, but what do we see in our eyes?  Are they sad, tired, disappointed or maybe happy, energized and full of hope?  When you walk away from the mirror, what image do you carry with you?  Our self-image will affect our character.  We cannot act differently than you see yourself.  Or treat people differently than you see yourself.

Our self-image is shaped by years of listening to others opinions about who we are.  The words that were said to us as children still ring in our ears.  If those words were not encouraging and helpful then we have an uphill battle every day as we try to overcome the picture they created in our minds.  Most people I talk with who are struggling with the self-image that was created for them by other people.  So what if we stop and think about, what God thinks of us.  And can we really know what God thinks of us?  I think we can know, because of what the Bible tells us about God’s thoughts of us.

King David was a man who wrestled with a self-image that included being forgotten on the day the priest came to anoint a new king.  His dad did not even invite him to the dinner.  David struggled with his own sins and wondering if God had forgotten him also. His struggles are recorded for us in the book of Psalms as he cries out to God over and over again as he seeks to find himself.  He is not perfect, yet there is a sculpture of him that is world famous.  I would like to think that the sculpture was created when David felt the way this verse from Psalm 139:14.

Psalm 139:14 says, “I praise you because you made me in an amazing and wonderful way. What you have done is wonderful. I know this very well.”  It was a day when David listened to God’s heart and words about him and let the other noise go.  He looks at himself and realizes that God made him like no other person before or after.  He begins to see that his self-image should come from God’s thoughts about him, not his own self-doubt.  If we stop and look around at all God has created and know that he took time with each one of us.  Our self-image needs to be grounded in His love and work in our lives.  Let his image of you be what you see when you look in the mirror.  He is doing a good work in creating you to become a beautiful person. 

Forget the fun house mirrors and their distortion.  Look into a mirror full of God’s love and grace for you.  He believes that you are good and worth so much more than you know.