We all have the tendency to want to define ourselves by the past. Our past successes are in the can. They are bankable. But it’s no good, because they are just that: they are past and gone. Few remember. Who you are is not who you were.

Marti tells a humorous story about how she and a good friend of hers walked into a crowded restaurant in a popular tourist town where a decade earlier they were both marketing big shots. Marti ran the Chamber of Commerce and her friend oversaw all marketing so they knew all the business owners and businesses in town. Because of that, they never had to wait for a table. Now suddenly, a decade later, they found themselves at the end of the line, and Marti’s friend couldn’t help but comment to the hostess, “Wait a minute. Don’t you know who we were?”

No she didn’t. It had been too long. This is true for all of us, but that’s okay, because you are not who you were — you are younger than that now — you are who you are.

I’ve been picking apart one of my earliest songs as a song of the Jesus Movement before the Jesus Movement was. The lyrics are as follows:

Look all around you and see what is real

Hear what is true and be sure what you feel

Touch someone near you in love if you can

Give all you have and be part of God’s plan

This song is not a memory from the Jesus Movement; it is a present tense song that will always be current because it is about now. It’s made up of present tense verbs: “look,” “see,” “hear,” “be,” “touch,” “give.” Sing it now and it is true now. This is always true regardless of who you were, because it is not about who you were, but about who you are. And who you are will always be younger than who you were.