How To Know Who You Are

I can feel it rumbling deep within me, that defensiveness.  The desire to set the record straight, the desperate need to clear my own name.

All it really means is that I can be quickly and easily distracted by the best way to be truly known.  It's not by shouting above the din and proving my point and making sure all the injustices I perceive are righted. It's not by letting my pride defend my honor at the expense of relationships that matter more.

I internally squirm, this discomfort of heresy like sandpaper on my skin.  "Turn the other cheek" sounds right, but my bruised heart wants more.  No amount of "working it out" at the gym or scrubbing bathtubs can give me any peace.  No internal venting can banish this nausea.


I've got to see what He says about it all.

It's there on the page and I read it twice.

 Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children  and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Ephesians 5:1

I don't understand at first, read it through again.  What does this mean for me?

It means "keep on keepin' on."  It means keep walking in Christ and letting His love flow out through me.  It means that all of the inaccuracies in the world do not dictate who I am, but who I am in Christ does.


Relationships can be messy.  People can forgive, and then forget they did.  Words, once said, can be held on to.  


But being a child of God means that, when I continue on this path with grace and honesty and yes, by turning the other cheek, He is glorified.

Which is what life is supposed to be all about, anyway.  Living like this could pour more grace into these chaotic human relationships.

It means that who He says I am is what matters. The least sensitive among us still can suffer a squashed ego, but it is in letting go of that where we can lay claim to the peace of knowing who we truly are.

It's True Love that keeps no record of wrongs.  Fallible people sometimes do.  But when we refuse to keep score, we are the ones who end up free.

I gather up all my hurt and hand it off to the One who makes burdens weightless.