I’ve been out of Junior High and High school for a few years now, and as I’ve began to walk through my adult years I’ve discovered a few things in my first couple years of university that I wish I was told when I was younger. You know when you’re feeling all the emotions of having your first crush, or in High School when you have to struggle with being uninvited. Or perhaps you look around and it seems like everyone is dating. Even though I went to church every week, and even attended a Christian school, I still did not completely understanding what my worth and identity in Christ meant. I had no idea I was missing something that could impact my life so deeply! I mean, what does knowing your worth, or knowing your identity even mean? As a girl, how can my identity be found in a guy named Jesus? Sure, I was told He loved me, but where do I go from there? Friends would come and go. New crushes would come and go; and when they went, when friends rejected me — I felt alone. When I didn’t get the response back that I wanted from my crushes — I felt unlovable. Have you ever heard people around you use the term, “forever alone”? I’ve heard friends say it targeted towards themselves in laughable, joking manner. But me? I truly believed that I would forever be alone! Everyone else had boyfriends. Everyone else had a great group of friends. So I wondered, why not me?
Loneliness took its toll.
“Embedded in our souls is a quiet wish, a secret hope we carry with us always.We want to feel wanted.Yet we struggle to fit in and to be included. It’s more common to experience rejection than acceptance. We’re more familiar with the bitter sting of being left out than with the delight of being sought out. All of us know what its like to be overlooked and unwanted.When was the last time you felt that way?Was it last week when a group of friends decided to get together and one of them never thought to include you? Or was it last month when you poured your heart out to a guy who expressed interest in you, only to find out that he didn’t share any of your romantic feelings?Perhaps the ache of feeling unwanted hit hardest when you were a child. You overheard your parents fighting and came to the conclusion that your existence on planet earth was an inconvenience to them.Or maybe more recently when you were caught off guard when you tried out for the ideal job [or sports team]. You waited days for the call. After convincing yourself that you would [be selected], you were told in an impersonal way that the position had been filled. You were not wanted.Yes, we all know the wrenching pain that comes from experiencing rejection!Our hopes are crushed, our feelings ignored, our hearts broken. What do we do? We pull back. We draw inward and give way to doubt and distrust. We brace ourselves against further hurt, and with a straight face we say that we don’t care. It doesn’t matter. No one can hurt us.And yet…The longing to be wanted continues to be the cry of our hearts. We dream of being sought out, included, welcomed and warmly embraced. But living as we do in the rubble of a fallen world, rejection, not acceptance, seems most to often to accompany us on our life journey.So why do we keep hoping? Why does the secret wish to be wanted never go away?…[Because] we were made to belong, to be accepted, to be included.” – Spoken For: (Robin Jones Gunn and Alyssa Bethke) p.9-10.
This excerpt by Robin and Alyssa is what started me on a journey; a journey that I am still on. This journey is one that leading me to fully recognizing, believing and living my identity in Christ.
This life you are given is a chance to embrace who you are and whose you are. It is about finding your worth in something much greater than yourself, your friends, your grades, your boyfriend, your family, your Instagram, or your athletic abilities. This is hard because it challenges our pride in these areas, and the reality is, every girl will wrestle with this to some degree at some point in their life.
Our teenage and young adult years are a crazy period filled with the best times and the worst times. From managing friends and drama, and boys and school, sports and trying to figure out what you wanna do after school and figuring out who you are, its a lot. And without a strong foundation and confidence in your identity, the inevitable reality is that it will be shaky — and my life has been no exception! I tell you these things because I want so badly for you to know that you are not alone. Sharing this is also a reminder for myself because I don’t wake up everyday and feel like my worth is in Christ. Wouldn’t life be so much easier if that was the case? What I’m learning is that life if hard work.
A Godly woman who I look up to and has encouraged me on my faith journey always says that we need to preach the truth to ourselves!
So wherever you are at, whether you have grown up in the church or you know nothing about God, I want to challenge you to come to this blog, with an open mind and be open to what God has for you, because it is nothing short of extraordinary. My hope is that you can embark on your own journey of discovering your worth, your identity, what makes YOU, YOU. I pray that your perspective of Jesus and yourself will be changed forever and that you can embrace who you are and whose you are.
So how do we embrace our identity in Christ?
Recognizing that you have a need to feel wanted and loved and realizing that no one can satisfy that need beside Jesus.
Seek his face. more than friends, more than boyfriends, more than grades or likes,
Read part 2 of this blog post found here https://beautifullylovedca.wordpress.com/2017/07/31/my-new-relationship-status/
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