What is the hardest thing you have ever done? Think about it. Maybe for some of you something physical comes to mind. I knew a man who built his entire house from the ground up. From digging the foundation to creating the architectural plans for his home, he literally made his own house.
Perhaps some of you are thinking of something academic or mental. In college I had a friend who was studying for his MCATs and he studied around the clock his senior year to prepare. Or maybe the hardest thing you’ve ever done is related to a decision you had to make on an important issue of life—getting married, having kids, choosing a career, moving to a new place.
All of these situations definitely present challenges, but I’d like to offer a challenge that I think is one of the hardest things you will ever do: create an identity for yourself. Think about it for a moment. This is no easy task! Remember the last time you went on to a website and were prompted with:
Create a username and password
Now imagine on the website of life a prompt coming up:
Create your own identity and live it out
Talk about challenging. What immediately comes to mind? What pieces are integral to who you are? Is it your talents? Write them down and take a look at them. Do any one of them stand out as being the one thing you want to build your identity on?
What about your virtues? Write those down. Now take a look at them.
Kindness
Patience
Compassionate
Great virtues, but what happens the next time you are unkind to someone or impatient with someone? What happens to your sense of identity then?
I think you get the point by now. All of these are good things, but they can’t be the ultimate things that generate and sustain our identity. Who we are as individuals is far too important of an enterprise to be left in mere human hands. Consider that all humans have limitations. Consider your limitations. You know your own weaknesses and shortcomings. Do you really want to add “identity creator” to the list of responsibilities?
I don’t know about you, but most days I’m lucky just to get out the door with keys and wallet in tow. Creating my own identity? No way!
That’s why we must go to the Lord for help. There’s a scene in the book of John where Simon Peter and Jesus are having one of those existential life-altering conversations (in my house we call these “come to Jesus” conversations, pun intended). Jesus and Simon Peter are talking about life and the way to God. Jesus asks Simon Peter pointedly toward the end of the conversation if, after all Jesus has shared, Peter wants to walk away from him. To which Simon Peter says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68).
I so wish I could have been with Jesus during Bible times because I would have loved to have been in conversations like this with Jesus and Peter. I can almost hear the pain, angst, doubt, and hope in Peter’s response. To paraphrase Peter, it’s as if he’s saying, “There’s nowhere else to go to figure out the big issues and questions of life. I’ve tried that. I’ve looked for that. I’ve tried to figure it out on my own, but there’s nowhere else to turn except for you, Jesus. You have the words we actually need.”
Peter’s testimony resonates and, in many ways, confirms what the Roman officers will say of Jesus in the very next chapter:
The officers answered, “No one ever spoke like this man!” (John 7:46)
There is something remarkable and unmistakable about the words of Jesus. His words bring life and clarity to the deepest issues of human existence, our very identity. What would it look like for the word of God to be what informs and forms who you are as a person? Wouldn’t that be a relief in many ways? To have the God of this universe who holds it in the palm of your hand saying to you, “This is who you are!”
Do you remember what you wanted to be when you grew up? A lawyer? A police officer? A teacher? Do you remember how your answer changed depending on how old you were, what your interests were at the time, and who your friends were? Looking back now on my list of preferred occupations, few of them map on to what I currently do. I dreamed of being a history teacher, a curator at museum giving tours, or a professor giving lectures in some ivy-covered school in New England.
“I am special.”
“I love me.”
“I believe in myself.”
“Love yourself.”
If you are a self-identifying Millennial or GenZer, chances are you have read, heard, or said these phrases. These phrases and others like them are the tenets of our current age; the cultural currency people believe they need to navigate the often treacherous waters of identity and self-worth. Philosophers and other cultural commentators have a name for this dynamic—expressive individualism. The simple definition of that belief is that the highest good an individual can achieve is to live an authentic and happy life.
When applied to an issue like personal identity, there is admittedly an appeal. Sometimes we can be too hard on ourselves. Often we don’t believe what is true about ourselves. However, when applied without constraint, expressive individualism is a dangerous and ultimately hopeless way to build a sense of who you are. Let me explain why…
Being ultimately responsible for your identity will leave you exhausted.
Building your own identity—your sense of who you are sounds great—but think about it. You have to not only figure out who it is that you want to be (and that’s harder than you think), you also have to sustain and maintain it for the rest of your life.
Being ultimately responsible for your identity will crush you.
Not only is this way of building personal identity exhausting, it’s also crushing. Why would something that sounds so freeing be crushing? Well, let’s say your whole identity is built on what you can achieve or do. Perhaps you want to be smart, successful, and make lots of money and your identity is wrapped up in that. Now, compare yourself to everyone else who is also embarking on this personal identity making journey. They too want to be smart, successful, and make lots of money. No matter where you look or where you go, there will always be someone else out there who is doing more, making more, and being more than you are. This is true no matter what you base your identity on—your work, looks, relationships, things, children—nothing you can think of will ever be securely yours. The nature of life is that everything keeps changing and there is always someone doing better than you.
Being ultimately responsible for your identity will make you unbearable.
Finally, building one’s identity solely on your feelings and self-worth will ultimately make you unbearable. Here’s what I mean by that. When there is no one with authority to bestow on you a sense of approval and affirmation, you now have to add that to your to-do list. You have to figure out who you are, and also work hard to get everyone else around you to affirm that. How does one go about doing that? There are two ways we often try:
- You have to constantly talk about yourself.
- You have to constantly post about yourself.
That’s exhausting. So what’s the remedy for this crushing, unbearable identity formation process? How about this? What if there was someone outside of yourself, that knew the very worst about you, and loved you in spite of that? What if the same Jesus, who spoke face to face with Peter would also speak face to face with you? He promises that he will and there is a whole Bible of his words to us. In there you can find the answers to the deepest questions of life from the highest and most trustworthy authority. Come to Jesus and know:
Who you are.
Whose you are.
Where you are.
You will never be crushed by Jesus. Instead of life being unbearable, he will bear your burdens,
Grounded in grace
Jonathan Holmes explores the five core areas of identity struggles most common to teens: sports, academics, moralism, sexual orientation, and gender confusion. He provides parents with a biblical foundation to work from and practical tools to help their teen find their identity based on who God says they are.
