One of my favorite parts of any RPG is character creation. I can easily spend an absurd amount of time mulling over every detail. What race to choose? What class? How do I want my character to look? I could spend all my time just creating characters and still have a ton of fun.
Character creation in games can be fun and interesting on many levels, but one aspect that I think is especially interesting is that making up a character in a game gives us a safe way to explore one of the most fundamental questions we ask ourselves as human beings: “Who am I?” Or, perhaps the better question would be “Who do I want to be?” Can you imagine if, before we were born, we could change, adjust, and fine-tune every single aspect of our bodies and personalities? What if we could choose for ourselves what skills and talents we would possess in life? It’s a premise that has been brought up in speculative fiction more than once and the questions that it raises are definitely worthy of our thought and discussion. What would the human race become? What would that sort of power to choose do to our identities as people?
All of this raises the question of what exactly is it that determines a person’s identity? What are the biological and social factors that we look to in order to determine who we are as individuals and who we are in the larger world? This is a very important question to ask because where we draw our identity from will have a profound impact on how we see ourselves and how we see others. It’s for this reason that a person’s identity needs to be based on something strong and hopeful, something that provides them with life and purpose.
The Bible provides for us the perfect place to find such a base. The book of Genesis tells us that we are all creations of God. In Genesis 1:27 it says:
So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.
Common English Bible
Human beings are the handiwork of God. We are all “handcrafted” by the Lord to be unique and to experience His love and grace. We are made to love Him and to be loved by Him. God knows all of His creations personally, even down to the number of hairs on our heads (even if that number is 0)! In Luke 12:7 Jesus says to his followers:
Even the hairs on your head are all counted. Don’t be afraid.
Common English Bible
There are so many things in this world that we can choose to establish our identity on. However, there is only one thing that provides us with the truest and deepest sense of who we are and what our purpose is in this enormous universe of ours. There is only one basis that is eternal and divine. When we choose to make God the foundation of who we are, then we are choosing to recognize not just Him, but we are choosing to recognize ourselves as well, ourselves as we really are. We are created to be beloved children of God and we are created to love Him in return.