Who ARE You?

It's funny, you can ask this simple question to anyone, regardless of age, and be met with either a blank face or a questioning look. Once they are over the initial confusion of the question, they begin to describe what they do, not who they are. I admit that I have done the same thing.  I begin to explain that I am a teacher, that I love to be outside and read, that I am the daughter of Ken and Barb.

If these answers aren't what spring into mind, people begin to describe what they look like; blond hair, blue eyes, 5'9", and so on.  Physical descriptions usually don't help us much when placing a person (especially when in a Dutch area and practically everyone fits that description).

Then we go on to personality, but only scratch the surface.  He/she is kind, quiet, funny, out-going, obnoxious, helpful, caring.  But even these answers don't get down to the core of who a person is.  When you strip away all that you do, and all that people see you as, you can finally get to the heart of the matter.

Surprisingly, or not so surprisingly enough, this question was brought to my attention by one of my students.  She is interested in pursuing a career in the medical field and one day while in the hospital, an older man posed this question to her.  She answered in the fashion that I mentioned before including her name and what her school involvements were.  But the man was not looking for that kind of answer.  He gestured to the TV and said, "look at this girl playing baseball.  She's a baseball player yet that's not who she is."  My student said that she talked with this man for 30 minutes and he was never satisfied with her answers.  Frustrated that the man would not answer his own question, she made her excuses and left his room.

Why is this question so hard to answer?  I believe that we have uncovered Satan at his evil work again.  We like to cover up the true answer with our worldly possessions and accomplishments.  We begin to identify ourselves by our titles, positions, or even jersey numbers.  This is all to distract us from what I believe to be the true answer.

The true answer to this question is that we are the beloved children of God.  Whe nall else is striped away, this remains true.  Because of this truth, it is the core of my identity.  The fact that I am a child of God drives my passions and motives.  He is the reason I am a teacher.  He made my eyes blue. He made me the person I am with the dispositions I possess.

I am embarrassed to say that this answer was not what immediately sprang to my head.  And when it did get there, I felt that the answer was too "Sunday Schoolish".  But the question and answer continued to bounce around in my head until I was struck by the truth of the answer.

Then it began to deepen and challenge me.  If I am truly a child of God, and that is supposed to drive my actions, is what I'm doing actually reflecting that? I would love to answer yes, that all my actions follow this truth, but I think that you and I both know this to be a lie.

Let me be clear.  I do follow God's path for me and in that trying there is success but there are also failures.  Yet God uses both success and failure for his ultimate glory, because what ever I do or say, I am his child and he is my father.  So perhaps the real question that ought to be asked is not who but whose are you?