Each week I look for a quote to put on my field hockey practice schedule to motivate and inspire my girls. On the website I use, I stumbled upon the immortal words of Dolly Parton: "Find out who you are and do it on purpose." Not a quote that applies to field hockey, but these words spurred my thoughts about how we should all live.
For many of us, the first thought that comes to mind upon reading Dolly's words is, "But who am I?" Certainly, we cannot be who we are on purpose if we don't know who that is. Personally, I have searched inside and outside for a definition of myself. In my search, I have examined my personality, my strengths and weaknesses, and the way the world reacts to me. I have tried to define myself by friends, my activities, and my job. I have prayed, yes, but I have spent more time looking around me than I have looking up for the answer.
Looking around me has gotten me no closer to finding out who I am than I was before I started. Actually, my search has left me more confused at my complexities. I'm starting to believe that the only way for me to find out who I am is to ask the One who created me. Only my creator who "knit me together in my mother's womb" (Psalm 139:13) and has numbered every hair on my head (Matthew 10:30) can tell me unbiasedly and without question who I am. If I keep looking around me instead of up to Him, I will never find the answer, and therefore I will never be able to live my life purposefully. As Neil Anderson wrote in Who I am in Christ about our needs for acceptance and belonging in the world, "If we attempt to meet them independent of God, we are doomed to reap the dissatisfaction the self life brings." Amen.
Once we find out who we are in Him, we can begin living our lives on purpose. We can purposefully look for opportunties to use our spiritual gifts. We can purposefully practice mercy, forgiveness, love, and peace in order to glorify God. Jesus described God as the purpose of His life (John 14:28, MSG), and we are called to live with the same purpose (Ephesians 5:2, 1 John 4:17). Finding out who we are requires reading the Bible and praying about who God says we are. Doing it on purpose means consciously practicing the lifestyle that God calls us to in the Bible and through our prayers. Jesus knew who He was and lived it on purpose, may we do likewise.
Posted by Kim at September 8, 2006 10:52 AMHow long have you been looking up to Him, yet still searching, finding, yourself and your purpose in life?
Posted by: russ at September 11, 2006 12:12 PM