Where is your identity?

A while back, Trash Box Jam came out with a song called "Samantha's Identity." It's a cute song, and I like it. I remember having a conversation after that with one guy. He asked me, "Where is your identity?" Now, he has trouble with his English, so I assumed he was making a mistake. My first thought was... "I don't know, my closet?"

But today, for some reason, I was thinking of this conversation again. And it dawned on me. The question is not as strange as I thought it was. I mean after all, we do put out identities in things, or places, or people. For example, basketball, football, significant other, kids, job, hobbies... The list goes on and on. When you have this thing, this place, this person, you feel alive, whole. But what happens when that thing is gone? What happens to your identity?

I talked about this movie before, but I was sent the movie "Friday Night Lights." Now, I'm not a big football fan, but the movie hits close to home in many ways. The thing is that all theses kids had their identities completely wrapped up in football. The star didn't have anything else. He was football. So when he was injured, he had nothing to fall back on. That was his only identity. He played football. All the other conflicts in the movie centered around identities and football.

So that's my question. Where is your identity? Is that a safe place? What happens when that person/place/thing is gone? Everything breaks. There is no perfectly safe place to keep something as important as your identity. In my opinion, insecure people and people with low self-esteem are people who don't have a place for their identity, or maybe not a stable one. And my solution to all of this is: people need a safe place for their identity. One that doesn't change. One that won't disappoint them or leave them. Where is that place?

For me, as a Christian, I can only think of one place: God. God is all powerful. He will never fail. God is love, He will never let me down. God is strong, He will protect my identity when I would fail. God is outside all circumstances. He is the only safe place for something like my identity. When I try to put it somewhere else, I will never be fully happy, fully complete. My identity is in God.

Ok, that's my sermon for today. I hope everyone is having a nice summer!