My best friend and I are reading Divergent (Veronica Roth) together. Not in a weird, joined-at-the-hip, secret book club kind of way. You should know me better than that.
We’re just basically the same person and like all of the same things and when her husband overheard us excitedly talking about wanting to read it before the movie comes out, he surprised her with a hard copy the very next morning in the sweetest gesture of love.
See, men…the small things really are the big things.
Anyway, the premise of this book (and soon to be released movie) series is about a young girl who grew up in one sector of society and at sixteen years old she is faced with the daunting choice of either staying in that “faction” for the rest of her life, or choosing one of the other four in that society, forever leaving the family she was born into to join a “family” in which she feels she can be herself and live out her purpose.
Talk about pressure. At sixteen, I couldn’t even decide on which outfit to wear to the football game with my friends.
At eighteen, most people can’t decide on which major to declare.
At twenty-two, which job offer is best.
At twenty-five, if they can really spend the rest of their lives with the person they've been dating.
And to think that she had to have her entire life “figured out” based on the results of a test and the tug in her heart.
Even though our society screams otherwise, I am so glad we do not have to have everything figured out to live a life of purpose.
I’m glad that the choices we make and the risks we take will always serve to either teach us a lesson or prepare us for the next thing that God has for us.
I’m glad that when we choose to leave the “faction” of a life of sin, that doesn’t mean we have to disown our families…but even if they disown us for our choice, we are promised a family in the body of Christ who loves and accepts us.
In Divergent, the main character based her identity on what she was told she should be by her family and her faction. The disconnect between what she felt in her heart and what she heard every day led to feelings of unworthiness and guilt for not living up to other people’s standards.
Doesn’t sound too different from what you and I struggle with daily, does it?
When I was in Nashville, I recounted the biblical story of Ruth with the college ladies in discussion of identity.
Upon returning to her homeland with her daughter-in-law after her husband and two sons died, Naomi addressed the people by instructing them to call her Mara, which means bitter (Ruth 1:19-22). Naomi was so wrought with grief over her family’s deaths that she recognized her character changing — her very identity as she knew it.
Whatever we name ourselves, that is what we become.
Unattractive.
Unworthy.
Anyway, the premise of this book (and soon to be released movie) series is about a young girl who grew up in one sector of society and at sixteen years old she is faced with the daunting choice of either staying in that “faction” for the rest of her life, or choosing one of the other four in that society, forever leaving the family she was born into to join a “family” in which she feels she can be herself and live out her purpose.
Talk about pressure. At sixteen, I couldn’t even decide on which outfit to wear to the football game with my friends.
At eighteen, most people can’t decide on which major to declare.
At twenty-two, which job offer is best.
At twenty-five, if they can really spend the rest of their lives with the person they've been dating.
And to think that she had to have her entire life “figured out” based on the results of a test and the tug in her heart.
Even though our society screams otherwise, I am so glad we do not have to have everything figured out to live a life of purpose.
I’m glad that the choices we make and the risks we take will always serve to either teach us a lesson or prepare us for the next thing that God has for us.
I’m glad that when we choose to leave the “faction” of a life of sin, that doesn’t mean we have to disown our families…but even if they disown us for our choice, we are promised a family in the body of Christ who loves and accepts us.
In Divergent, the main character based her identity on what she was told she should be by her family and her faction. The disconnect between what she felt in her heart and what she heard every day led to feelings of unworthiness and guilt for not living up to other people’s standards.
Doesn’t sound too different from what you and I struggle with daily, does it?
When I was in Nashville, I recounted the biblical story of Ruth with the college ladies in discussion of identity.
Upon returning to her homeland with her daughter-in-law after her husband and two sons died, Naomi addressed the people by instructing them to call her Mara, which means bitter (Ruth 1:19-22). Naomi was so wrought with grief over her family’s deaths that she recognized her character changing — her very identity as she knew it.
Whatever we name ourselves, that is what we become.
Unattractive.
Unworthy.
Unreliable.
Untalented.
Unsuccessful.
Untalented.
Unsuccessful.
Unqualified.
Unloveable.
Unloveable.
Un-motherly.
Maybe someone else has spoken these over you.
Maybe the enemy whispers these in your ear.
Maybe you picked up where they left off and instead of your face in the mirror, you see these words.
But whatever we name ourselves, that is what we become.
How about breaking the chain today?
What about naming ourselves the way God sees us.
Beautiful.
Worthy.
Full of grace.
Beautiful.
Worthy.
Full of grace.
Equipped.
Redeemed.
Restored.
Daughter.
Redeemed.
Restored.
Daughter.
Beloved.
Called.
Find your identity in Christ. Claim the names that He has given you. Cast away the guilt that cripples when trying to fit into the identity other people have manufactured for you and rest in the peace of the identity for which you were created.
Be divergent.
Find your identity in Christ. Claim the names that He has given you. Cast away the guilt that cripples when trying to fit into the identity other people have manufactured for you and rest in the peace of the identity for which you were created.
Be divergent.
“Even before he made the world,
God loved us and chose us in Christ
to be holy and without fault in his eyes.
God decided in advance to adopt us
into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.
This is what he wanted to do,
and it gave him great pleasure.”
Ephesians 1:4-5
“For we are God’s masterpiece.
He has created us anew in Christ Jesus,
so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”
Ephesians 2:10
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