Did you know scientists believe it is in our remembrance of the past and anticipation of the future that we find our sense of self? Our identity?
What we have been through shapes us… the people we meet, the relationships we form, the events, both good and bad, that stick out in our minds… this system of remembrance is the same part of the brain that imagines what the future may hold. We use past experiences to fabricate events we have yet to experience. Our brain is always somewhat active in this process… like a time machine our brains bring us into our pasts and futures, remembering who we have been to understand who we might become.
The danger here is that when we take on life alone our identity’s can become clouded… we lose sight of who we are by having a false self perception. The things you have done wrong, traumatic experiences you have been through, the people you have hurt and the ones who have hurt you…. all these things cling to you, building upon each other, until the load is just too heavy to bear.
I have been here before. I have been so broken that the brokenness began to bleed out into everything I touched… every thought I had of myself was tainted. I didn’t know who I was, so I tried to be who I wanted; not surprisingly, that failed too. When I began to form a relationship with God this started to change.
Verse 5 of Psalm 139 reads, “You’ve gone into my future to prepare the way, and in kindness you follow behind me to spare me from the harm of my past” (TPT).
God, the all-powerful, all-knowing creator is the maker of our minds. He understands that in our past there is pain and harm… but he is a God who lives outside of time. He can heal us completely from experiences we never thought we could break free from. He has the ability to reach into history and heal our hearts in those raw moments of pain. He is not afraid of our mess, but is so incredibly eager to sort it out with us.
My past is not only healed—the more I understand and ask God about this, I can see that it’s as if the hardest parts of my past never even occurred. For, “If anyone is enfolded into Christ, he has become an entirely new person. All that is related to the old order has vanished” (2 Corinthians 5:17, TPT).
Now this, a past filled with the presence and hand of God, is something I can happily find my identity in… and not just any identity, my TRUE identity; the person God has created me to be. Walking in this truth, that I am made new completely, makes for the anticipation of a future filled with God’s hand as well. And not just anticipation, but a knowing that he is already there writing the story of who I will be and what I will do.
My identity is not found in my past. My identity is not found in my future. My identity is found in GOD, the Holy, perfect being who not only shapes my life story like clay, but died for me to experience the freedom only He can bring. When you have this type of God-given identity, it no longer matters what people think. My life is for an audience of one.