Sam Hodgins discusses feeling like a fraud and her new identity in Christ
Seventy percent of people are reported to have experienced ‘impostor syndrome’ at least one time in their life. It’s that feeling you have when everyone around you seems to know what they’re doing, but you have no clue. Or when you’ve been asked to take on some responsibility, but you feel like a fraud and wonder when you’ll be found out.
I for one have experienced it most of my life. I grew up in a non-Christian home where God wasn’t mentioned. I had no understanding of the Bible and had no Christian friends or influence in my life. After secondary school I trained as a hairdresser and landed lots of jobs, some were okay, and some were well paid. I even got a job as a hairdressing tutor despite not having the qualification. Experience made up for it, or so I told myself. I met all kinds of people during that time and in the last 15 years Christians seemed to ‘pop up’ in my life, all of whom were faithful in telling me about Jesus. So, after a couple of years I ‘prayed the prayer’ and I was a Christian!
However, it wasn’t until months afterwards that I really knew what had happened. It wasn’t simply a case of ‘I prayed a prayer’, but instead I realised that God had first drawn me to Himself by His word and the Holy Spirit’s conviction of sin, and that He’d been working through all these people in my life.
If they really knew me
Not long after, I married a wonderful Christian man and soon we were serving in ministry. I even got a paid ministry role. But there was a constant nagging in the back of my mind: ‘Do they really know who I am, what I’ve done? If they did, they wouldn’t like me.’ I lacked assurance of salvation and at every opportunity I could, I would pray for God to save me. Guilt and shame weighed heavy on my heart and I kept thinking it would all fall apart soon – was I even a Christian after all?
That haunting feeling
Years later I was funded by the Presbyterian Church of Wales to be a mission worker. I had a desire to learn more, so I did an access to theology course and got a distinction – I was amazed! People encouraged me to consider further study and having looked around, I settled upon Union School of Theology.
However, I felt that same haunting impostor feeling and I very purposefully put obstacles in the way. I thought I wouldn’t be ready to do further study. After all, I’m a hairdresser with a shady background and no academic training! I was like Gideon, putting out fleece after fleece, assuming God would get fed up and close the doors on it, but He didn’t. I applied, and to my surprise, was offered a place. I kept thinking though, ‘Once I fail, they’ll realise who I am and it’ll all be over’.
In God’s mercy, during this first year, and perhaps more decisively than ever before, I’ve come to really grasp how God sees me through the lens of His Son. I may (often!) think I’m an impostor, and perhaps others around me think the same, but God has called me to be His. I am in Christ. My sin is paid for on Calvary’s hill. No one can condemn me, no one can detract from the transaction made, for ‘it is finished’. I am chosen, redeemed, adopted and forgiven. Of Christ I can say ‘my beloved is mine, and I am His’. Now when that haunting feeling of impostor syndrome bubbles up, God reminds me who I am in Him, and it brings me to blissful tears.
I’ve just completed the first of many years of study, and God amazes me every minute. His grace is sufficient, for in my weakness His power is made perfect.
Impostor syndrome? I still feel it sometimes, but when I do, I think of Him, and ‘I know that while in heaven He stands, no tongue can bid me thence depart’.
