I am chosen by God who called me out of the darkness of sin and into the light and life of Christ, so I can proclaim the excellence and greatness of who He is. 1 Peter 2:9
Identity. This day in age we take our identity for granted. We are not careful enough with our personal information and identity theft happens all the time. If we don’t like who God made us to be, we can “identify” as anything we want to be – anything at all.
An article I read recently on ClashDaily.com listed a few things that are “acceptable” now days since anything goes:
- Age — Your kid can drive and vote if they “self-identify” as being older than 21.
- You should be able to retire if you “self-identify” as being 65.
- You get to fly for reduced fares on airlines if you “self-identify” as a child.
- We can all ask for senior discounts.
- We don’t’ need driver’s licenses, passports, or concealed carry permits since we can identify as anyone we want, whenever we want.
We have made it ok to not be or to be whatever or whoever you want to be according to convivence to you. It may not be so easy to get away with all of these - and there are many more! There is a whole spectrum of other filters or labels we can use to identify ourselves with also. You can use all kinds of filters on social media from unicorn horns to a filter that makes you look 30t years older, or you can identify with your enneagram number, and the wings too.
All these ways to identify are not going to matter when we face the King of Kings on Judgement Day. As Christians, our true identity in Christ is the only identity that matters. We cannot have that identity stolen or taken from us and we never need to identify as something different. Being a child of God and knowing our identity in Him is salvation to us.
When we find our identity in Christ –
- We seek to glorify God in all areas of our life and do not seek fleshly desires – We don’t need to identify with anything else except Him. We find our worth and fulfillment in Him only. We don’t need a filtered world of untruth to hide in.
- We have no fear of the future – We can trust in the gift of eternal life He gives and find hope in the midst of hopelessness.
- We don’t have to compare ourselves to the rest of the world when our identity is found in Him. We only have to please Him, and we don’t have to live up to the world’s standards. We have our own individual gifts that He gives us. We all glorify God in our lives in different ways.
Are you seeking identity in something other than Christ? He loves us enough to take our broken hearts and offer us true identity as His child, even when we are seeking identity in all the wrong places. We will never be fulfilled as long as we are not finding our identity in Him alone. We were created to reflect His glory, and if we are seeking identity apart from Him, it becomes about us and not Him. We are His children, loved, accepted, and made completely whole by Him.
