Who Printed Your Label?

Who am I really? How do I know who, and what, I’m supposed to be? That’s a question that each of us has to answer, and one that we wrestle with throughout our lives as we grow and situations change.

In high school we took a survey, answered a whole list of questions, and it came up with career choices for us. At the top of my list, my results told me I should be a priest or a rabbi. That didn’t happen.

My guidance counselor saw that I was good at math and science, knew that my dad was an engineer, and determined that I should pursue engineering like he did. That didn’t happen either.

I was a rebellious and somewhat independent teen, so I did my own career search and made up my own mind to become a physical therapist.

So after many years, who did I turn out to be?

I’m still a physical therapist. I’m a mom, a wife, a sister, a daughter. I’m an animal lover, a farm girl, a crazy chicken lady, a dog mom. There are lots of labels that can describe me. But do any of them truly describe who I am? How am I supposed to know which of these labels is actually me?

When an inventor comes up with a brand new idea and starts to build it, no one else knows what it is or what it will be for. They can come up with ideas of what it is, how it works, and what it should do by looking at it through the lens of what they’ve experienced. They might get pretty close to the truth. But only the one who designed it and built it really knows for sure. The only way to get it right is to ask and learn from the one who created it.

When Alexander Graham Bell created the telephone, it was a brand new creation. If he had made it and not explained it, they probably would have come up with all kinds of different explanations of what it was, what it was for, and how to use it.  He explained it, told people how it worked, showed them how to use it. They listened and put it to use the way he explained, and it became an invaluable household item.

The same is true for me. The only way to know for sure who I am, what I was made for, and how to live that out is to ask the One who created me.

For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.
Ephesians 2:10

Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. 
Ephesians 3:20

God is the one who created me physically, and then re-created me spiritually. He knows every detail of how I work, how I think, because He is the one who invented me. He is the only one who knows exactly who I am, what I was made for, and how I am to be used in His Kingdom.

The people around me may try to guess at my purpose by looking through their own clouded lenses. They see physical attributes, things I have, and things I’ve done and use them to assign labels that they think will fit. At times I can actually manipulate these labels into what I want by doing certain things or acting in certain ways. Other times circumstances that are beyond my control seem to print those labels. These labels that are attached to me, either by myself or by someone else, can begin to define me and become reality in my mind. I become what they tell me I am.

So I can choose to identify myself by labels printed by those, including myself, who were not involved in my creation,or I can choose to go to my Creator and ask Him who I am, what my purpose is, and how I am to be used. He will be overjoyed to show me the answers. Any inventor loves to be asked about his invention. And when I allow myself to be put to use in His intended way those other labels fall off. I become a small piece of His plan, and an invaluable asset to His grand purpose.

Where are you going for answers? Who do you want to define you?

I spent years looking for answers in the wrong places. Upgrade your search. Stop believing opinions that are based on perceptions, and look to the source of Truth. Let Him print your label, and then put it on and live it out.