S5 E2: Understanding the Difference Between Your Identity and Purpose

Hey friends!   This episode is going along with our 2nd week of sacred sunday’s of September can you believe we’re already halfway through the month?!?

 I’ve loved hanging out with you these past few weeks and hearing your takeaways during the week and how God is speaking to you. 

  if you would like to join in on the conversation, come hang out with us in our private group on FB that was created just for you! 

 Just search under groups and look for the SHE IS PODCAST COMMUNITY and you’ll find a group of women cheering you on to be all that God created you to be!

So let’s talk about Identity and Purpose

Our identity and purpose can be so intertwined that we really don’t know the difference between the two sometimes. 

The definition of identity is who you are, the way you think about yourself, the way you are viewed by the world, and the characteristics that define you.

We find our identity in our roles, the things we do, and how people perceive, and more importantly how we perceive ourselves.

I love how Galatians 6 starts off in the message version…

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.

Now you know I love me some personality tests and when I discovered the enneagram several years ago it became my all-time favorite! I l loved the language it gave me around some of my 4ness haha ...and has been super helpful in relationships, but I’ve pulled back on referencing my Enneagram number in the last few months and actually, a lot of it had to do with she is awakening course I have been working on.  

One of the things I’m so passionate about is helping women awaken and step into the uniqueness of who they were created to be so I started feeling this tension between focusing so much on particular numbers or personality types.  As helpful as these tests can be they are a tool and NO ONE person fits neatly into any ONE type.

As with everything in your life... Having God at the center of this careful exploration of the work you have been given is what will help you gain actual clarity.

How many of you as you have gotten older have discovered there are words people have used to describe you in another season of your life and you realized those opinions and words are keeping you stuck and they don’t resonate with who you are

There might be traits you have identified with because people have always put you in that certain box so you assumed it was correct.

It’s ok to grow and pivot and change your mind on some things you thought you knew to be true. We can trust the Holy Spirit to lead and guide us into truth (it’s his job)

Let everyone be devoted to fulfilling the work God has given them to do with excellence, and their joy will be in doing what’s right and being themselves, and not in being affirmed by others. (passion)

Galatians 6:4,5 

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life. ( the message)

Purpose- the reason for which anything is done, created, or exists

You, my friend, were created on purpose WITH a purpose.  That’s not just a cute saying or thought.  It’s the truth and what God says over you.

Roles and vocation changes… but the purpose doesn’t  

All of us are called to love God with all our heart soul and mind and our neighbor as ourself

And there’s your unique destiny as we talked about last week in looking at. Ephesians 2:10 there is a specific purpose you were created for

So throughout your life, the expression of your purpose might play out differently in different jobs or circumstances but your purpose doesn’t change…

We’re going to be talking about season next Sunday, but this why you don’t need to get frustrated and fight the season you are in. The purpose God has for you isn’t confined to a particular season. If you surrender to his purpose and looking to him to guide you I promise you whether you can see it or not he is doing something in your life no matter what season you find yourself

We identity with our roles...find our identity within them and here’s where things can get tricky as it comes to purpose

When roles change we are disoriented we’ve seen this in these last several months in dealing with the virus.

People’s jobs changed, it affected their marriages and so many areas…

Which makes me wonder if what they were identifying with was stronger than the understanding of their purpose

This is natural...I can see in every stage how I have had a period of adjustment…

After I got married as excited as I was to have married my husband it was an adjustment “being his wife

Then when I became a mother...same thing’

And in the last few years becoming -Mimi

Anyone else relates to feeling like they are sometimes having to play “catch up” when roles are added?

Without the foundational understanding of who we are in Christ and the security of who we are in him, we will struggle in our identity…

We will be looking to relationships and jobs and things to add to the void we are experiencing

We have this illusion that adding the roles (wife, mother, ...will fill the void but it can’t

If you’re single you can think if I can just find “the one” he will fill all 

Or you could be married and think if I was just single again….

At some point you realize you are the common denominator in all of the scenarios and until you know who you are it’s really hard to have an honest life-giving relationship with anyone or anything

Because you are always looking for that person or thing to give you something you feel you need

In writing out some notes for the time tonight the word choice kept coming up for me and I kept pushing it down because I was thinking what does choice have to do with talking about identity and purpose?!?

And maybe it’s a continuation of what we talked about last week around destiny and I had shared in the week’s podcast too about how I believed I could make the wrong choice or take the wrong turn and totally mess up the plan and purpose God had for my life...I now know that’s not it works with God.  So after several times of it coming up, I’m assuming someone needs to hear that our choices do matter very much. 

We don’t need to be anxious about it but we shouldn’t move through life with the mindset of my choices really don’t matter because even though we know  God can as Ephesians tells us “ work all things together for our good” we still have to live out the consequences of “ALL THE THINGS”

So here’s your HW for this week>>>

Take some time and reflect on the different roles you have and notice how your identity tied up in that relationship ...or job… 

Are your expectations healthy or are you looking for his person or thing to fill something in you where you feel like you are lacking?

Can you see ways you have missed finding fulfillment or recognizing your purpose because you were overidentifying with a particular role or relationship?

Ok, let’s pray…

Thank you for every person that is watching this now and will watch this at some point…

Open our hearts and minds to what you are doing in our lives.

Give us clarity around our identity in you and the things you have purposed for us.

We love you and we are looking to you always!