The squirrel that lost its tail

Today as I was walking through the park I saw a squirrel that did not have a tail. It was running along, holding a nut. The only difference between that squirrel and other squirrels was that it had an identifying factor missing. I stopped and studied it intently for a while, it looked as though the tail had been cut of, or it had caught onto something, but it pointed to something painful happening for that squirrel to lose its tail.

This got me thinking and God placed a lesson on my heart just looking at this squirrel. We in most scenarios can become like this squirrel. Because of tough/harsh live situations and or mistakes we can have certain parts of our identities stripped away. For me I would have to say it was a collective of mistakes that affected me as such. In college, I went a bit wayward; bit is an understatement, I went completely wayward. I went to every party and I drank for most part of the week. Every day could be a party day for me. And as a result I ended up making some questionable decisions with regards to my virtue. Like the squirrel that lost its tail, I lost my integrity and my standing in front of man. When people looked at me they saw a broken, misguided young lady that was beyond redemption. I still went about my life as though everything was normal, but I had lost my identifier, my innocence and my integrity in the eyes of man. I struggled as I tried to find my identity again in my own strength.

And isn't this what happens to most of us and we end up in a loop seeking any validation that we have gained our identity back.

The thing that was outstanding about this squirrel for me is that, inasmuch as it had lost it’s tail, I could still identify it as a squirrel and although a tiny stub remained where the tail used to be, I could see the healing. My point is, although our identities may be stripped from us and we may not know how to gain them back or how to live in spite of having lost our defining factors, the beauty of God is that he still identifies us as His children. He still sees us the same through the blood of Jesus, our saving grace, our identity complete. This is the one thing I think we struggle to comprehend as humans, that regardless of how much we mess up, or how much we are broken, or even how much we lose in the world, we never lose our true identity. No Matter how much man might look at us and see loss and the brokenness and the pain, our identity remains the same, like the squirrel that still remains a squirrel regardless of the lost tail. And what is our true identity you might ask? We are children of God, loved beyond the sin and the mess. That will never change!

35 "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?36 As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;

we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:35-39