Antique Roadshow, Baseball Cards, and True Self

Lately I have been working through a lot of internal issues. Fear. Apathy. Self-Hatred. Anger. Selfishness. Deep Pain. Loneliness. These things have been bubbling to the top as I spend time allowing God to walk with me into the depths of my being. Through prayer, both speaking and listening, the Spirit has enlightened areas in my life that lay hidden in deep darkness for so long. As these issues emerge I can't help but feel like I am a really messed up, broken person. In the recesses of my mind I have always struggled with the reality of my own twisted nature. This past week, at a prayer conference, I was reminded that the twisted self is not the true self. We are created beings, and at the core of who we are is our true self, our created self. The journey with Christ in this life is to nurture and reconcile that true self in the midst of our world. To pray that His Kingdom would continue to establish itself in my life.

Sometimes when I am flipping channels I get sucked into the Antique Road Show. The basic premise of the show is that people bring their old crap to old crap experts, or something like that. Actually these experts are brilliant, they are able to see and find the beauty and value of pieces that I would throw out on the sidewalk for free. It might be a name, or a style, or a small mark on the piece that unlocks the mystery. Often the piece is not in a perfect state, it has been worn out through the years. Time has not valued it and left it pristine. The condition of each piece has a direct impact on its value, but the value is most deeply tied to its originality or quality of creation that the antique experts unveils. Or sometimes its just a fraud.

I once had a Frank Thomas Jr. rookie draft card. It laid in boxes with all the other baseball cards I had accumulated in a brief season of card collecting. Over time I traded cards, lost them, and gave some away. I gave this specific card to one of my little brothers. One day I was looking through the values of baseball cards and came across the value of this specific card, which at that time had risen over $1000. Which at that point in my life would have been like a million (not that I have ever had any idea to whom or how you sale such things). So I went to get it back from my brother only to find it bent up, essentially removing all of its value. Beneath my very fingers had been this little card worth unimaginable amounts of money, for me at that time, and I had just not known or cared about its value. I gave it away, it was mistreated, and the value was gone.

Is this the way I am, is this the way the value of my true self plays out in the eternal drama. Is the mark of the maker barely there but still has an impact on my desirability and value, even if life has torn and twisted me. Has my value been diminished by the way I have misused my life many times. Or maybe I am just a fraud. Am I like that baseball card, where my own bentness makes me essentially valueless. Is my value connected to my perfection. If this is the way things are then I must protect and build my image, I must work hard to look like I have never been used up by this journey of life.

Money on the other hand is very different. It's value is not connected with the state of the item itself. You can spit on a dollar bill, crumple up a dollar bill, draw on a dollar bill, and even rip a dollar bill but it still retains its value. The value is not in the state of the bill but in what lies behind it. It is just paper, just a small piece of paper. But because of who printed it and guarantees it, this paper holds a specific and (relatively) unchanging value.

I think what I am coming to realize is that we are more like that piece of paper we call a dollar bill. We are uniquely and beautifully created. Our true selves hold and reflect the beauty of the creator and king of the cosmos. I do not need to find my value, or restore myself to return to my value. I just need to accept my value, accept who God created me to be, accept my true self that Jesus loved so much He died for. Then I need to live from that place, from my true center as an image bearer.

Our call is to live out of the true self, but for me there is so much garbage in the way. Pain I've caused and received through my life. Lies I have believed about myself. Jesus has been speaking to me, calling out my true self, and helping me to peel away some of that other stuff. He is my Father and I am his son. He is my creator and I am his creation. He is my lover and I am his beloved. He is my King and I am his servant. I am lovely because God loves me. I am once again hearing the call not to become something different but to return to the core of my identity, to once again find who I was truly created to be.