{"id":3273,"date":"2025-05-17T18:16:27","date_gmt":"2025-05-18T01:16:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/?p=3273"},"modified":"2025-05-17T19:36:47","modified_gmt":"2025-05-18T02:36:47","slug":"the-identity-that-can-never-be-shaken","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/blog\/the-identity-that-can-never-be-shaken\/","title":{"rendered":"The Identity That Can Never Be Shaken"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><strong>Mimi (Xinyi) Li \u674e\u6b23\u6021<\/strong><\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div><span style=\"color: #333333\"><em><strong>Editorial Note:<\/strong> Mimi\u2019s testimony reminds us that even at the lowest juncture of an identity crisis, God\u2019s love remains our solid foun<\/em><em>datio<\/em><em>n.<\/em><\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<div><a href=\"http:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/02\/love.jpg\" rel=\"lightbox[3273]\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3274\" src=\"http:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/02\/love.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/02\/love.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/02\/love-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/02\/love-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>My name is Mimi, and I\u2019ve been blessed to be a part of CBCWLA over the past year. This church family has been such a meaningful part of my journey, and I\u2019m grateful to be here tonight to share how God has worked in my life this past year.<\/p>\n<p>So, a little about me: I\u2019m a PhD student at UCLA. I\u2019m a mechanical engineer by training. If you\u2019re into MBTI, I am an ISFJ which stands for Introverted, Sensing, Feeling, Judging. Basically, I\u2019m someone who values structure, reliability, taking care of others, and a just a little dose of perfectionism. I\u2019m an only child. I was born in China, and I\u2019m the youngest of my extended family. I grew up in a small suburb outside of Washington DC. I went to school in Pennsylvania. And my social security number is\u2026well we don\u2019t have to go that far.<\/p>\n<p>As you can see, I\u2019ve spent a lot of time defining myself by my work, my personality traits, and my upbringing. For much of my life, I found my identity in being a good student, an only child, and a \u2018nice\u2019 person. But this year, that foundation was shaken in ways I never expected.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Firstly, I think many of us, especially those from Asian backgrounds, can relate to the pressure growing up to do well in school. From a young age, it felt like a lot of my worth was tied to my academic success. And for a long time, I did well\u2014throughout high school and college, I was consistently the top student, getting good grades and many times annoying my friends when I\u2019d get upset over a 94 instead of a perfect 100. It felt like I was on the right path to \u201csuccess\u201d, and the praise I received made me feel like I was exceeding expectations. But that all changed when I started my PhD. Suddenly, I was thrust into a difficult environment where I was working under a supervisor with very high expectations and a strict approach. What was once a source of motivation for me\u2014meeting and exceeding expectations\u2014became a source of immense pressure and crippling anxiety. The more I tried to prove myself and work harder, the more I seemed to fall short. My identity as a \u2018good student\u2019\u2014someone who always excelled, always had the answers, always received praise\u2014shattered.<\/li>\n<li>Secondly, another part of my identity that was shaken this year was my role in my family. Growing up as an only child, I had an idyllic childhood. I was surrounded by love and attention from my parents, and I never lacked anything. With my parents, I knew an unwavering sense of safety, comfort, acceptance, and belonging. However, things began to change when my mother passed away in 2018. Then, last year, when my father remarried, I found myself facing a heartbreaking truth: my identity as the only child in our close-knit family, the center of my parents\u2019 world and them being the center of my world, was no longer the same. Suddenly, I had a new family\u2014one with a stepmother and a younger stepsister. It felt like a part of who I was\u2014something so foundational to me\u2014was slipping away, and I didn\u2019t know how to hold on.<\/li>\n<li>Thirdly, another aspect of my identity that was challenged this year was my sense of self as a \u201ckind and caring\u201d person. The past years, amid a toxic working environment and the changes in my family, I found myself becoming increasingly bitter, reticent, and resentful to all the people around me. The pressure at work, the constant struggle to meet expectations, the sadness of my family changing\u2014it all built up in a way I couldn\u2019t control. And in the midst of it, the worst of me came out. My dad, stepmom, stepsister, boyfriend, my closest friends became the targets of my frustration, and I said things to them I deeply regret. It was a painful realization to see how much hurt I was capable of causing to the very people who cared for me the most.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div>The uncanny thing is, wherever I placed my identity became points of insecurity.\u00a0 I placed my identity in my achievements, my family, and my character, but none of these were strong enough to bear the weight of my sense of self. Each of them\u2014no matter how much I tried to hold on\u2014proved fragile and temporary, leaving me constantly anxious and fearful of losing them. The normal human struggle is to look for identity horizontally\u2014something in creation to define who you are. We might have a successful job for a season, healthy and fulfilling relationships for a season, but those things can be taken away from us\u2014or never given to us at all. But God has designed us for something greater\u2014to receive our identity vertically from him, something that can never be shaken.<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=1%20Peter%202%3A9-10&amp;version=NKJV\">1 Peter 2:9-10<\/a> says \u201c9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God\u2019s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.\u201d<\/em><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>I find it amazing that as Christians, God chose us\u2014there is no other qualification. Why did he choose me? I do not know why; it wasn\u2019t because of any merit or worthiness in me that set me apart. It certainly wasn\u2019t because I was a hardworking or kind or caring person\u2014in fact I fell short of every metric I tried to meet, yet he still chose me. There\u2019s nothing I can do besides bow at his feet in humble acceptance. The gospel reminds us of the depth of our sin and need for salvation. Left to ourselves, we fall short, and our sin separates us from a holy God. When we unmask the human fa\u00e7ade of self-delusion we are forced to confront our true natures\u2014how warped and wounded we really are. In that tender place, we realize we cannot save ourselves and, in his mercy, he took our sin upon himself on the cross, absorbing the penalty we deserved, so that we might stand before him cleansed and forgiven. We are his possession\u2014the ones he will walk among and reveal himself to over and over again in personal relation forever! He has given us a new identity in him in order that his identity might be proclaimed through us.<\/p>\n<p>In my brokenness this year, God revealed his character and mercy to me. Despite the terrible words I spoke to my stepmom and stepsister, despite the pain and heartbreak I caused my dad, despite the horrible ways I took stress out on my boyfriend and close friends, I received patience, care, and understanding. The darkest parts of me were exposed but, I was not only accepted but loved. How amazing it is to be fully known (all the good and the bad) and yet be fully loved because of Christ! God saw my father and stepfamily\u2019s heartbreak over my refusal to accept my new family and in his mercy, he opened my eyes to see their unwavering love and care for me that can only come from Christ. In his mercy, God also made a way for me to leave my stressful work environment and transition smoothly to another lab for my PhD. It wasn\u2019t through my own fleshy striving but purely through his care that he that placed the right people in my life\u2014those who encouraged me to leave, a program director who understood my situation, and a new lab with similar research that allowed me to continue without delaying my graduation time. His hand was evident in every part of this transition, surrounding me with professors who cared to ensure that I wouldn\u2019t have the same experience again.<\/p>\n<p>How humbling it is to realize that when our identity is rooted in what we achieve, pride follows our successes, while failure brings shame. Like Adam and Eve, we end up trying to cover our flaws with the \u201cfig leaves\u201d of good works, or we hide away, burdened by guilt. How amazing it is that the gospel offers us something far better! Through faith in Jesus\u2019 life, death, and resurrection on our behalf, we are who we our\u2014forgiven, loved, accepted, and good\u2014not because of what we do but because of what God has already done.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mimi (Xinyi) Li \u674e\u6b23\u6021 Editorial Note: Mimi\u2019s testimony reminds us that even at the lowest juncture of an identity crisis, God\u2019s love remains our solid foundation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":3274,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3273"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3273\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3465,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3273\/revisions\/3465"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cbcwla.org\/home\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}