LiveGrace

This is the time of life for new beginnings and new adventures. Everyone is excited for going off and making their own story. It is time to start their chapter in the big book of life. There are so many great and wonderful things as your future unfolds, but a scary reality can be brushed aside. You are leaving behind not just your family, friends, or house, but what your identity has been made up of for the past eighteen years.

Your identity that is perceived by others comes from many things: your school, job, people you spend your time with most often, the sports or activities you are involved in. I know for me that Des Moines Christian is a huge part of my identity. It was one of the major things in my life that taught me my values and morals. The people surrounding you at DMC for the most part have the same standards. DMC has taught me how to figure out what I believe and has given me so much wisdom. It has given me people I can strive to be like. It meant something to me to go there. Des Moines Christian was somewhere I was proud to say I went to school and it was part of my identity. But now, no longer am I student at DMC.

At the end of the summer, I will leave my friends. There is a saying I have been told time and time again, “You become like the five people you spend the most time with.” I have amazing friends that are part of my identity and have shaped who I’ve become. They will always be my friends, but as I move I will be in a place I will need to make new friends. I can no longer rely on my identity from my group of friends.

My Twitter bio as I look at it today starts with: {DMC 2017. Track. Volleyball.} This is how I defined myself and wanted to be recognized as when people were getting their first impression of me from my profile. I am no longer a volleyball player and for the time being, as I just had surgery, I am not currently a runner. The activities I was involved in were very much a part of who I am. I devoted most of my time in high school to sports and getting faster and stronger. These also formed my identity.

All of these things are what I’ve known and who I’ve been, but they are coming to an end now. They have made me who I am and will continue to shape me as they will always be my foundation. But I am faced with the reality that I must start over. No one knows me where I am going and saying I went to Des Moines Christian and these are my friends has no meaning to them because they don’t know these people or places. I must be able to show them my heart by finding my next adventures there and displaying who I am from the beginning. This can really freak me out if I don’t realize the truth in where my identity is found.

While all these things make up my identity and who I put myself out there as, there is only one that will always remain constant and never changing. I am a daughter of God. My worth is found in Him alone and not the things I do or where I come from. He knows my heart even when the people I will be meeting will not. And there is grace in the times that I forget where my identity truly comes from. This brings such freedom in knowing that though it seems like everything around me is changing and scary, the most important thing, the only one that really matters, will never change and He will never leave.

So I can take a breath and pause and thank my Creator that He so graciously calls me His daughter. In the times of fear and unknowns, He reaches out His hand and tells me to trust Him. My worldly identity may be changing but my true identity will stand firm. Because of His love, we can walk into uncertainty with confidence that He will care for us and fill us. The things we are leaving behind will always be where we were formed and the future is where new pieces of our identity are yet to be discovered, but the core of our identity will stay constant as we have a consistent, never-changing Father.

With grace and love,

Olivia Mars