Life Is Who You Are

As a child when I was bored and my mother would ask me what was wrong I would say, “I don’t have anything to do.” Apparently we learn early on that life takes on meaning, significance, and fulfillment primarily from what we do. As we grow this perspective becomes increasingly distorted and often takes on a life of its own. Sports, grades, and relationships give us a sense of self-worth. Later, career paths, leisure activities, and keeping busy tell us that we are contributing to life and are therefore significant. I don’t want in any way to demean the importance of what we do in this life. The choices we make to do what we do have a profound impact on our life as well as the lives of those around us. However, I think that in many ways we have turned things a bit upside down. Many of us tend to pursue life as if what we do IS who we are. In other words, apart from what we do life really doesn’t hold much meaning. That’s why so many people have such a difficult time when it comes to retirement. It’s why illness or injury often takes such an emotional toll on us. When we can’t do the things we want we are often left with an aching sense of worthlessness and insignificance.

I was thinking of this the other day after watching a rather thought provoking movie and the phrase came to me, “Life is not so much what you do, but who you are while you’re doing it.” I doubt that it is original to me. It probably came to me because I have read it someplace, but until I remember where (which is unlikely) I will lay claim to it.

We become far too obsessed with what we do, and in the process we forget that character is far more important than activity. True meaning and significance has more to do with character than it does with busyness. Activity doesn’t fulfill us. Who we are while we are active (or inactive) is what fulfills us. In other words, what we bring with us into the actions of our lives (the “doing”) is what offers us a sense of joy and fulfillment.

Romans 5:3 says that “character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us”. Isn’t it interesting that character is the thing produces that which encourages, inspires, and fulfills us (hope)? It doesn’t say that activity produces hope which doesn’t disappoint us. It says that character does this. Hope does not come from the things that we wish will happen (health, the right job, relational healing, etc). Hope is not born outside of us but within us. Who we are determines hope and fulfillment more than what we do. [Now, there is an aspect of hope that does comes from outside of us in that God is the ultimate source of hope but that hope must become incarnate in our character for it to impact us.]

If we really took this seriously it would cause a monumental shift in our outlook on life. It would change both who we are and what we do. Activity would take on new meaning because meaning would come from inside of us. Times of inactivity would be far less annoying because character always seems to fill the empty space that inactivity creates. We become far more comfortable with just “being” and less insistent on always “doing” something.

Someone once said that character is what you are when no one is looking. I don’t think that’s true. I think that character is what you are, or at least what you should be, when everyone is looking. The things people see us doing, and not doing, should be a reflection of our character.

So next time you find yourself neurotically searching for something to do, make sure you first of all have found something to be.

“To those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called TO BE holy… grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

1 Corinthians 1:2-3