Friday, April 20, 2007

My identity in God

Lately I've been pondering about my identity in God. We all know that it's not easy to live in this world. People reject us, and sometimes for unknown or unfair reasons. Sometimes we try to "do more", or perform even better, just to gain someone else's acceptance or praise, or even to make ourselves feel better. As we get older, we start to lose our looks, and some people may start to suffer a crisis of identity at that point too. A lot of us may feel insecure about what others think of us. Some of us have the fear that maybe we're just not "special" enough. I think everyone feels this way from time to time, it's a normal part of the human psyche. Then I think about who I am to God, and I instantly feel special and uplifted. God cares about each of us equally. He cares enough to make us each individually different and special. He cares enough to make us in His image. He cared enough about us to send His own son Jesus to die for our sins. We don't have to "perform" for God, because our salvation is once and for all. If God loves me so much as I am, then it becomes a lot harder to feel down about myself. I feel free to be myself without pretences in front of God, which in turn gives me the confidence to be myself to other people as well. God's already seen the worst in me and still loves me. People aren't as forgiving, but maybe we should stop caring too much about what other people think. After all, their standards are arbitrary, God's standards are absolute. The first three chapters of Ephesians tells us what our true identity is in Christ: "blessed, chosen, predestined, given, redeemed, forgiven, included, marked, been made alive, saved, raised up, seated with, created, brought near; they are fellow citizens, they are members, they are being built together". That's good enough for me.

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