In this day and time, you can Google “Who am I?” and websites with online quizzes show up.  They claim by asking you a few questions they form a visual DNA of your personality.  Of course, I was drawn by curiosity and had to take a quiz.  The results found that I am an optimist, thoughtful, relaxed, easy going, sociable, spontaneous, need help with organization, practical, traditional and have good taste.  All of that from a 5-minute quiz.  I believe there is a lot more to defining who I am than just taking a quiz.

Webster defines identity as the character of who a person is.  So, what defines your character?  Your character is defined, when you commit yourself to a set of standards that never change.

As a teen, I committed to everything my boyfriends or friends liked.  I really didn’t know who I was or even why I was on this earth.  The movie Runaway Bride is a good example; she didn’t even know what kind of eggs she liked.  She conforms her life to every person she was with.

I had been raised in Church my whole life and religion was not an option in my house.  At age 12, I was saved and filled with the Holy Spirit.  By the age of 17, I put my running shoes on.  I didn’t seek God for direction.  One self-oriented decision after another leads me to be married at 21.  After a marriage of eight and a half years and two children, I had to face my family with the news I was getting divorced.

Even with the pain and heartache of divorce, I still didn’t turn to God.  Instead, I started dating again, whomever I wanted to.  BIG MISTAKE!  Yet more and more years of my life gone!  I had no goals, nothing I wanted to do. I felt like I just existed for no reason.  It took one man to wake me up.  It was by one question he asked me.  “Have you ever wondered what our purpose is, why we are here?”  I answered, “I was always taught that if you put God first you know your purpose.”  He responded, “You put me first, so you have no purpose.”  I have never had anything hit me as hard as that statement did.  WOW!  God used that man to shake me up.  I don’t think I left my house for 2 days.  I sat on the couch in the window, cried and prayed.  My heart was so heavy.

God brought back to my memory everything He had done for me.  Starting when I was 17, I got in that bad wreck.  Well, I was in the hospital for 14 days and eight of those days I spent in intensive care to a teenager that’s a long time. I had broken seven vertebrates in my back and ruptured my spleen, the doctor said that I was only, ¼ of an inch away from severing my spinal cord.  On day seven, they pulled my parents into a little room and told them they thought I had pneumonia and without a spleen, I would not make it.  Anyway, they planned to do the CAT scan the next morning to see how bad the phenomenon was and all this time no one told me what was going on.  My family called everyone they knew to pray for me.  My mom came in the room it was in for the last visiting of the day and I remember she didn’t have to say a word and I knew something was wrong by the look on her face.  I started crying because I knew they were keeping something from me.  The nurses came in and made her leave because she upset me.  They put a tube in my nose that went to my stomach, which put a die in there so they could do the scan.  I still remember feeling that tube in the back of my throat.  I was on so much medication I couldn’t think straight much less pray.  I managed to pull the tube out of my nose three times that night until the tied my arms down on the bed.  I just knew that I didn’t want to be there anymore.  I remember looking out the window and seeing a brick wall on the wall I saw an image, That I will never forget it was Jesus’ face and I felt a piece in my heart right there at that moment and I knew I was going to be ok.  The next morning the nurse checked all my vitals and everything was back to normal they didn’t understand how.  I didn’t go for a scan that morning instead they took me out of intensive care and gave me a private room.  To this day, I feel like God spared my life for a reason.

God let me know that even though I left Him that He never left me.  “I am with you always” Matthew 28:30.  God knew what I needed, He always did I just had to surrender and stop trying to fight my battles alone.  God is my purpose in life!  We are not on this earth for ourselves; we are here to make a difference in someone else’s life.  The only regret is that it took me so long to get it.  It is never too late to redirect your character. After fasting and prayer for direction, I enrolled at Lee University, where I graduated Magna Cum Laude, not to bad for a single mom.  It is amazing the things you can do in your life if you just put God first.  I can guaranty if you surrender your life to God, you will find out who you are.  Don’t settle for just existing.

Since that day on the couch, He has taught me so many things.  Let me tell how God showed me that he controls everything on the earth.  I bought the book “The purpose driven life” I felt like God wanted me to give it to my friend, the one that told me I have no purpose.  Our kids attended the same school; I was sitting in carline arguing with God.  I told God I didn’t want to give him that book.  I don’t want to talk to that man.  I feel stupid doing this.  My heart was so heavy.  The feeling wasn’t going away.  Picture a big school with 400 parents picking their kids up at one time.  They have to circle the parking lot and there is only one place in the line that you passed the traffic coming in, it is after you get your kids and you are headed out.  I still didn’t want to give him that book.  I said ok God, If he is at the spot where we pass each other, I will hand him this book.  In my mind I was thinking, he would never be there, he’s always late and I won’t have to give him this book.  I greeted my girls, they shut the doors, and I began to pull forward.   Setting right in the curve was the man, now my heart was in my stomach! I rolled down my window, said here a book for you, and took off!  My emotions were about to come unglued, I could not hold back the tears.  God, I guess I forgot how big you are.  Think about this, that man had a 20-minute drive to the school.  There were 400 cars coming through that carline.  There was only one spot that we would cross paths.  Every stoplight, every car on that 20-minute drive had to be perfect to put him in that spot at that exact time.  I could not tell you if that man ever read the book, I just know that God was trying to show me that He is in control of everything on this earth.  That a stoplight doesn’t change without Him knowing.

If you feel lost and that you don’t know why you are here, the first thing you need to do is pray.  I talk to God as if He is my best friend.  He’s always been there right beside you.  It’s your choice to talk to Him.  It doesn’t matter what you have done in your past. If you read the Bible you will see that most of the disciples, were not always good people, before they met Jesus.  Think about Paul, he was killing Christians before he got saved.  Look at everything he has done after that.  It is not too late, it doesn’t matter what everyone else thinks.

God gives everyone a choice just like Jonah had.  Just because you are moving forward does not mean you are moving in the right direction.  In Proverbs 19 God teaches us that we have many ideas nevertheless the counsel of the Lord, is the only way to find the right path.  If you have bought a ticket to the wrong city like Jonah, tear up that ticket before a whale swallows you.  Take it from me, I have been swallowed, and spit back out a few times.  Don’t be hard headed!!!   Let go of that life and let God take over.