Mistaken Identity

Hayley loves to make lists and carry them around with her until they are tattered and torn. One of the lists she frequently works on is a list of all the children she plans on having. She has completely worn out several "baby names" books. [See photo: she is reading a baby name book while we are camping.]  These lists are exhaustive with pages of children's names. I have seen lists where she will pick a child's name for each letter of the alphabet - that's 52 children with a boy and girl for each letter. She will also assign them middle names. I have seen many of these lists over the years. She has a boyfriend with a seizure disorder and they talk about getting married when Jesus comes and they believe they will be healed from their disabilities.

I never realized how much having a handicap was a part of her identity until one day she showed me her list of children and each one on the list had a different handicap next to their name. She had blind children with a seeing eye dog, autistic children, children in wheelchairs, deaf children, and the list went on. I objected - reminding her, "But, I thought there wouldn't be any people with handicaps when Jesus comes." To this she irritatingly replied, "Don't trash my dreams!"

This statement rang in my ears for days, weeks - months even. My daughter didn't have the ability to see herself, in the future, without a handicap. As I listened and looked around at myself and others, I began to see that my daughter wasn't so different in this respect. I saw many people's identity as mistaken - barriers - holding them back, frustrating them. My eyes were opened and I realized more than ever before that our identities should not be based on what we do for a living, how many children we have, our IQ, our status or any other thing that is temporary. Our true and unchanging identity is that we are children of a Heavenly Father who loves us. Anything else is a mistaken identity and too limiting.