Reflection Paralysis

Middle age shouldn't be confused with the Middle Ages. Historians tell us that while the rest of the civilized world was advancing in those centuries, Europe was blanketed in the "dark ages." No one looks back on the Middle Ages in Europe and says, "those were the good old days," (save for the then dominant church, the land barons and perhaps the Barbarians.)

Middle age, on the other hand is hopefully a season of enlightenment. We come to know ourselves for what we really are. We become more self-evaluative, more reflective. We learn to appreciate and value our primary relationships. We come to terms with our own mortality. Our "legacy" becomes a more viable concern. And I can find myself paralyzed in the process.

I found myself in a high school classroom last week talking about "identity" with the students, and how our identities are formed and informed. The consensus among them seemed to be that (with collective regret) we tend to allow our past, our culture and other people to determine who and what we are. This got me thinking.

Is it possible that with the onset of middle age we find ourselves less constrained by the opinions of others but increasingly shackled by our past? Do our own failures and unmet expectations now determine who and what we are? If so, I'm toast.

It's taken me, and continues to take me a long time to acknowledge who I am. And it may be that my own season of middle age is forcing the issue. There is a choice to be made, even as it may not appear to be a this-or-that crossroads.

I can choose to be dictated by my history of failures and unmet expectations. I can be disappointed by having exhausted my supposed entitlements. I can hope the culture and people in my life will somehow affirm me enough in order to affirm myself. I can hope my "good's" outweigh my "bad's." But I know where this option leads: failure and unmet expectations. A vicious cycle. (If I don't learn from my history, I am certain to repeat it.)

Or, I can place the source and stability of my identity in Someone else's hands. My Bible tells me that Who God is, and What God has done determines who I am and how I can live. It's not about highlighting what I've done well, or glossing over what I didn't do so well. It's not about trying to convince other people I am more admirable than I know myself to be. It's not about blaming culture or other people, fanning the flames of a victim mentality. It IS about acknowledging God's work, through Jesus, on my behalf, unwarranted and unearned on my part, determines and informs who I am now.

It's a choice to believe that it's not what I do, but what Jesus has already done. That's grace. And that's the choice I make. Because, here in my own middle ages it's the only option that doesn't end in darkness.