Christian Concepts

Bringing your Potential to Light

Self-Image

Is this a Cross?

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Reading time: 2 minutes

I recently came across a cross. Or what someone told me was a cross.

As far as I know, the artwork was done with the right heart. The inscription said something like, “God told me to leave the cross open.”

What does this picture of an “open cross” mean to you? On a positive side, it could mean that the cross is open to all. And if that means all who want to develop a relationship with God can repent and accept Jesus’s death and resurrection, I’m all for it. God’s invitation is open to all.

Being a mostly organized person I appreciate order. Most of the time my desires aren’t pathological like Monk (the Obsessive Compulsive Detective). I like symmetry. I also like abstract and symbolic art.

But for some reason, I find this depiction of the cross to be… disturbing. It feels like an attempt to be modern gone bad. It crosses over into something new age. It waters down the truth. It makes the work of Jesus look incomplete and… cheap.

In fact, the more I looked at it, the more I felt uneasy. I see a swastika, not a cross. But apparently, the swastika is a cross of sorts — a hooked cross. To some cultures, it has a positive connotation but to others, it is associated with terror (according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika).

So, maybe this is a psychological test — a Rorschach of sorts.

What does my interpretation say about me? I’m more of a purist when it comes to truth. I look for the simple truth and become uneasy with trying to dress it up too much.

I like that God made men and women different with distinct preferences. I see consistency and meaning in gender. The physical appearance of our bodies is representative of the underlying spirit and personality God gives us. For more on gender see https://christianconcepts.com/why-gender-is-binary.

Here’s my attempt at an open cross.

I’m not saying this discussion is a matter of right or wrong. But for my own sense of peace and order, the first cross just… crosses a line for me.

What do you see and how do you feel about the first cross?

Improve Your Communication

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Reading time: 3 minutes

How easily can you put yourself in another’s shoes? How possible is it for you to see life from another person’s perspective?

When communication is poor in a relationship, it usually has little to do with choosing the right words. Most people have a decent vocabulary. Communication problems come from:

  • An (often stubborn) desire to go in a particular direction (that is different than the other’s)
  • An inability to see life beyond your own perspective
  • Assuming other people think and feel the way you do

We see things not as they are, but as we are. Because it is the ‘I’ behind the ‘eye’ that does the seeing.

Anaïs Nin

If you’ve never seen a four-legged animal, you’ll probably have a hard time understanding someone’s love for a dog.

Your ability to understand your world is limited by your experiences and your identity. You can always get new experiences, but you can't get a new identity. However, new experiences will help you understand your identity. Share on X

You’ve heard the expression, “get on the same page,” right? All this means is having an experience of the same thing. Even after this, communication requires work because every person is different. Each person looks at the same dog, but sees, feels, and responds differently.

As much as being on the same page is helpful, it requires a tremendous amount of effort because there are so many experiences that haven’t been formed at the same time. One person might have experienced a dog bite when they were 8 years old. Another person in their twenties might call their dog their best friend. How would these two people get on the same page? As you can see, there’s plenty of room for bias and plenty of reasons why they would struggle to communicate.

Let’s pretend you have an awesome camera that takes super high-resolution pictures and a low-def monitor. What kind of experience will you have looking at the picture?

What if we switch it up? What if you have a super high-resolution monitor, but you take a picture with a low-res camera? Same experience, right? Both pictures will look distorted.

In this example, the picture is the common experience and the monitor represents each person’s identity. The same picture will look different on different monitors.

The monitor can’t change. While you can change, you are limited like the monitor to what you can perceive at any given moment. God hard-wired your identity to see life in a specific way. He doesn’t intend for you to ever see it exactly like anyone else.

This brings us to a plan to communicate better. To improve your communication:

  • Have more experiences; each one changes you and helps you understand
  • Have more shared experiences; each one gets you closer to being on the same page
  • Practice describing what you see to each other, but realize you’ll never get it perfect, only close enough
  • Recognize each person sees the same experiences differently
  • Recognize each person has different motives and desires
  • Recognize each person is unique and will always only see life through the lens of their God-given identity
  • Be patient with the process; the best understanding develops over a long time

When all else seems to fail, there is love and empathy. Love overcomes the frustration from the lack of ability to know what it is like to be someone else. No one else has ever been you, so they can’t know for sure what it’s like. But you can empathize because everyone knows what it is like to feel pain and discomfort and then experience peace.

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4 NIV

Peace and comfort are universal experiences.

Image by Ryan McGuire from Pixabay

Is Your Identity Defined By What You Do?

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Reading time: 3 minutes

Identity can’t be defined by what you do. It’s the other way around: what you do flows out of who you are.

The two are correlated though. What you do provides clues about who you are. But you are always more than what you do. And, in the case of a mistake, one moment in life doesn’t have the power to immortalize you.

What do you helps you discover your identity, but it doesn’t create or define your identity.

At the moment you came into existence, you have your identity. It serves as a map like your DNA. Life experiences are like sonar waves going out to detect your identity. Even what you do can be like identifying waves. Sometimes those waves contain distortions and you might get the wrong impression of who you are.

Your self-image is your best estimate of who you are. Your self-image is a limited, distorted version of your true identity. You limp along in life to some degree because you don’t know what it’s like to be completely free from the distortions. You can’t know, at least not in this life.

You can change your self-image to move into alignment with your identity. But your identity is fixed and unchanging for all time. That should be reassuring. You’re not aiming for at a moving target. You can become more aware of who you are.

Your identity is defined by your creator. If you want to know who you are, you need to ask God. So in this sense, who you are is somewhat of a mystery. Only God knows your identity completely.

Some people try to wrest control of their identity from their creator. “I’ll define myself my own way apart from God. I’ll manipulate my physical appearance, my body, and maybe even my DNA.” But this is only a superficial change compared to the identity God created for you.

You can observe your identity by looking at how you react to life experiences. You can also define it based on the truth found in the Bible. For example:

  • You are made in God’s image (similar to God but different, like how women are similar to men but different). See Genesis 1:26–27
  • You are a spiritual being that God made with intention. See Genesis 2:7
  • You are created to accomplish great things. See Ephesians 2:10

And there are many other defining statements in the Bible. Some of the definitions apply to everyone (everyone is made in God’s image), and some apply only to those who have become believers in Jesus Christ (Christians have a renewed spiritual connection with God and experience His love in a more intimate way – see 2 Corinthians 5:17 and Romans 5:5).

Then there are the specifics that only apply to each individual. You are unique. No one else has the same combination of abilities and perspective on life. You see God in a way that others need to hear. Your voice and contributions are needed – otherwise, God wouldn’t have bothered to create you. You are significant.

To define the specifics, you can look at your:

  • physical appearance and athletic ability
  • sex (male or female)
  • cognitive and emotional patterns and preferences
  • personality patterns
  • spiritual gifting
  • work preferences

When you start to notice the patterns in all of these, you will have a stronger sense of your identity.

As you seek your identity, remember that you aren’t self-sustaining. You can’t keep yourself alive forever. You have a distorted self-image. You need to look beyond yourself to find your identity. You are defined by your context; God is where you came from, and if you’re a believer, God is where you will return.

How are you doing with discovering your true identity? What struggles or obstacles are preventing you from realizing all God made you to be?

I posted this answer on Quora for the questions: Is our identity defined by what we do? If not, what is it defined by? If you like my answer, upvote it on Quora.

Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay