11 November | Youth
«For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.» Ephesians 2:10
We are constantly forgetting who we are and trying to fill that void with anything that promises immediate relief. If we do not know who we are, we also do not know our real meaning. This results in a lack of pleasure in what we do. So we start to fix our identity on what others say about us. “What is wrong with me?” This is the question that daily torments those who do not know their true identity. “Who am I?” “What is my worth?” “What should I do in life?” These are crucial questions for defining our identity. Without clear answers to these questions, we make a handful of bad decisions. We are led to look for love and affirmation in all the wrong places.
Time magazine classified the time we live in as shameful culture. We are pressured to share in the public sphere what, in essence, belongs to the intimate and private. It is as if we do not have the freedom to act otherwise.
On any popular news and entertainment portal, we are always being reminded of our physical inadequacy in relation to manufactured and increasingly artificial standards. On social media, the celebrity empire and excessive personal exposure encourage us to achieve unnecessary ideals of fame, beauty and the like. This highly uncomfortable pressure of our time fragments personal identity, distorting our perception of reality and the true needs of life.
To begin with, we are not what others want, but what Jesus wants. You are not what you do, but what Jesus has already done. What you do does not determine who you are; who you are determines what you do. It is important to know this before doing anything in life.
Do not let one moment define your entire life; Jesus is the one who defines your existence. In alignment with God's Word, you have to replace the lie with the truth. You can choose who you will believe. Believe the Scriptures, which say about us: “We are God’s creation.” This is your true identity.