Role Model

I’ve just come to understand my fascination with civil war era slavery. I used to tell people that I wish I was black or that I had been a slave. And people’s reaction was “Huh?” I think I’d feel the same way if I were them. But a desire to be a woman of color existed, too.

But it’s not the actual race, I guess, that interests me, but rather, the stereotype. The strong, courageous, compassionate women living self-lessly, fearlessly and enthralled with the Lord is so attractive. They comfort they seem to give, the inner beauty they possess was all so attractive to me. I realize now that I was looking more for a role model.

So what in us craves this need for a model citizen? Maybe that would be the “god-longing” that we’re called to have—the need for some semblance of perfection to look upon, and a role model to show us how to live our lives. In the Christian world, we are to model our lives after him. We are to desire to be like him. But I think we already have the longing wired in us.

We long for the comforter, the refuge, and the protector as child (which happen to be our parents). And biologically, physically, chemically, how we’re treated by our “protectors” affects the way we turn out. How they act; things they say.

Therefore, I believe we are biologically wired for a perfect model, a savior, a god. Atheists mock religions saying they are “man made”. Why would made create what they did not need? We needed answers, we needed to worship (we were made to worship) so we “created” God. Or maybe, although part of what we feel may be “created”, God himself, put in us, this vision of himself. And through that, birthed the religions.

Of course, how religion started, how God began to reveal himself, I believe dates with the Bible. Could it be written in metaphors? Could there be answers that God himself doesn’t leave in the book for us to know? I absolutely believe that. My God is incomprehensible, and I will never fully understand him. He is a mystery, which is why it is so easy to be allured to him. He never changes, yet no matter how much you know of him, you never know everything.

Therefore, I don’t know the origin of this need. I don’t know how God biologically wired us to “create” his books, looking from a secular standpoint. I just know that even people who aren’t of faith, have similar desires. They long to worship. They need a role model. And they long to feel loved.