Who Do You Want to Be?

I turned 35 years old today. It’s a weird age, though I think all ages are funny in some sense. Far from childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood yet constantly reminded by my elders of how young I am. I feel neither young nor old. My body still has a certain measure of limberness while at the same time slowly betraying me in the smallest of ways (five months of tendonitis is just one example). 

I am at an age where many of the choices of your twenties come back to either haunt you or reward you. The dividends of time invested or time wasted, make themselves evident here. While many of us feel stuck at this age, falsely believing that all we are now is all we will ever be, it is not too late to make a change or learn something new. 

Many of us feel this way because this is the age where we’ve accepted most things about ourselves. I am comfortable with my love for good food, reading books, and still thinking I can learn to dunk, even if I am the only one in my immediate sphere who cares about these things. I didn’t learn to love myself and what I was interested in until I was thirty. Prior to that, I often felt some sense of shame because it was usually just me carrying my particular interests. 

This brings me to where I am today, asking myself who I want to be. I’ve been asking myself this question for a long time. If you know me outside of this, then you know the well of introspection never runs dry over here. A few weeks ago I preached at a retreat for college students. The weekend theme was built around 2 Corinthians 5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, and see, the new has come!

I have often felt large gaps in my life. Gaps between expectations and reality. Gaps between my position and skill. Gaps between my skills and my desires. But most pressingly, the gap between who God says I am and who I think I am. 

Paul tells us in this passage that if we’ve trusted in Christ then we are made new. The Greek word used for creation there implies something made from nothing. Meaning, the newness we have in Jesus is something wholly different from what we were before. 

A few months ago I was hanging out with a group of people I’ve known my entire life but haven’t spent any significant time with in almost fifteen years. You know how those hangouts go, there’s a lot of reminiscing about the past. It was frustrating to hear people talk about the new me like I was still the old me and even go as far as to imply that people don’t change, you are who you are. 

I think what bothered me the most is how right they were on some level. I often feel the “old man” trying to creep up on me. While I’ve been made new, I still have to wrestle with the flesh that formed me so long ago. Paul describes this battle so well in Romans 7:14-25.

On my best days, I know that those lingering thoughts and untimely words are devices of the enemy. The whispering in my ear that I am not worthy is a message I’ve fought my entire life. I would do well to remember How Paul follows up the agonizing internal battle of Romans 7: Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:1). 

So who do I want to be? I want to be a man who lives worthy of the call set before him in Jesus. I want to be free. I want my character to match the faith I profess. I want to be a man who never stops learning and growing. I don’t ever want to be so prideful as to think I’ve got it all figured out. I want to be a good husband and father. I want to explore my many curiosities without feeling shame for doing so. Lastly, I want to run this race well, as well as I can, and in the end, hear the words: well done my good and faithful servant.