My Identity Is Not About Me

Elizabeth Stone once said, “Making the decision to have a child - It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.”

But what happens when that child is gone? What happens when children grow up, leave for college?  What happens when time is cut short and your heart is not only outside your body…but far off, distant, in a place you cannot see? 

What happens when your heart is scattered in a thousand pieces, and there seems no way to retrieve each one of them?

I lay my Bible down and sit at the round table.  A beautiful soul describes how everything she has known has been stripped straight from her.  Pieces…scattered.  And how do you know who you are, when everything is gone, and there is no visible substance to stand upon? 

Another tells of her scattered pieces; how life has tossed her, shaken her from what she used to cling to.  I can relate. 

As a foster parent, it is can be easy to lose your identity, or to place your joy in people or scenarios that might fail you. 

Sometimes, (no a lot of the time) I forget that I am only human.

I remember the day He left.  I took his hand and we walked nearly a hundred steps around a park I haven’t dared to go to since.  He didn’t say a word; didn’t run to play, didn’t race around like his little legs usually do.  We just quietly walked, hand in hand, on that stone lined path, as if we both knew, huge pieces of our hearts were about to be torn out of us.

After nearly two years, did he know what was coming…the loss, the tears…as I left him with his new parents? 

Sometimes it’s hard to find out who we are, when life comes to wreck us, health fails us, people betray us, loved-ones leave us, never to return home again.  Our identity can feel scatters, lost, tossed into a million places. 

At that circled table at our women’s group; we worship.  We lift God in our center, offering Him abandoned hearts, willing heads, and empty hands.  All of us standing with pieces scattered.  None of us are alone in our brokenness.

Yet there, abandoned under His banner of love, something happens; God grabs those lost, broken, hurting pieces and glues them to the Rock (Him).  And even if a sledgehammer comes, we have nothing to fear.  No matter where our hearts lies, nothing can divide what He died for. 

Our son sweeps across my mind, and then another Son reminds me that nothing we have left or lost, nothing that has been torn from us, will separate us from the love of God.  He takes our fragments and makes us whole.  It is because of His sacrifice, we can lay at His feet even the most destitute pieces of our soul.  

That path, our little boy and I walk that day… It’s rock footing, no coincidence…Our moment, our unspoken message, that stone…a forever reminder….

We don’t need to hunt for, dig for, or fear leaving our hearts outside our bodies.  Radical love is a call to abandon ourselves; trusting God, in His time, in His way, to pick up the pieces. 

For isn’t real, sacrificial love to give and keep giving, even when we know we aren’t getting anything in return. 

And if God is our identity, can’t we trust Him to pick up the pieces? Make us whole? 

When it’s all about Him anyway.

Check out the rest of the Not About Me November Series

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About Jen

Though born, raised, and still living only miles from where she grew up, Jen's heart lies in the nations. Jen loves the beautiful tapestry found in the wide diversity of people, different cultures, and all nations.  Jen and her husband have been married twenty years, and have parented fifteen kids and counting; twelve foster, one adopted, and two bios.  Her multi-racial family reflects her passion for unity, desire for faith without walls, and missional mindset to share both the gospel and the power of redemption to a world desperately needing the hope found in Jesus Christ. Jen and her husband have led in a variety of ministries; including prayer, small groups, children's, and women’s.  Jen advocates for the orphan as a board member for the non-profit, A New Song; and loves doing missions work internationally, along with her family.  You can find Jen writing about faith, while challenging her readers at her blog, Rich Faith Rising, as well as at tweeting faith-filled messages @Jen_Avellaneda .  Jen is also on facebook.  

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