So, the other week, I lost my wallet and
man it was a sick feeling. I searched
high and low for it in my house, retraced my steps and revisited the places
that I went. I went online right away to
check if my cc had been compromised. It
wasn’t, so that was good. I prayed about
it too and still nothing and then hours later, I rechecked the closet again and
there it was at the bottom on top of a pair of shoes…it had fallen out of my
jacket.
Amidst all the franticness, one of my kids
says to me, “Dad, are you ever worried that someone could steal your identity?”
When we think about our identity as
followers of Jesus, there is always someone who is right there ready to strip
us of any confidence, any sense of assurance of who we are as God’s children
and that is of course, the enemy, Satan.
He comes to steal, kill and destroy our identity . So, it is absolutely
important that we don’t lose it. Here’s
the truth though, he can’t take it away from us, but He can sure do his best to
make us feel like we’ve lost it.
When we think about our physical identity,
it is often right here, (point to pocket) but spiritually I want you to focus
on your identity as a believer here (point to head and heart).
Proverbs 23:7 As a man thinketh in his heart,
so is he.”
Proverbs 4:23 “Above all else, guard your
heart, for it is the wellspring of life.”
Jesus came to give us life more abundant,
life to the full, a life free from comparison, a life free from titles or
status. When we are IN CHRIST, we have
this incredible freedom to be who we are, who God created us to be.
Don’t let the Enemy steal your IDENTITY
You
have been REBORN FOR THIS
3 All praise to God, the Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly
realms because we are united with Christ. 4 Even before he made the world, God
loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. 5 God
decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself
through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great
pleasure. 6 So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who
belong to his dear Son. 7 He is so rich in kindness and grace that he purchased
our freedom with the blood of his Son and forgave our sins. 8 He has showered
his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding. Ephesians 1:3-7 NLT showered (lavished)
As followers of Jesus, it is not what we do
that determines who we are; it is what
we believe that determines who we become
AND that is why it is so important that we have a rock solid
understanding of who God says we are!
·
Blessed with every spiritual blessing, adoption,
brought into His family and seen as holy
·
You are loved, chosen, you are
without fault before you even took a breath.
It was all God’s initiative, it was all
through the finished work of Jesus and here’s the amazing thing. He did all of this and proclaimed this over
you because HE WANTED TO DO it, You give HIM great pleasure.
One of the biggest lies that the enemy
works on you early in your relationship with God is your assurance of knowing
that you are a child of God. I certainly
struggled in this area and he loves to create doubt, confusion and even
manipulate what others say to you.
So, Paul wants to establish a firm
foundation for this young church in making it absolutely clear about what God
has done for them. I want to do the same
by reiterating the wealth of our resources and identity as followers of
Jesus.
Practically, we need to keep our identity
in front of us and if that means on the mirror in our washroom or on the fridge
so that we allow these truths to really sink in!
Don’t get STUCK on your SELF
Our own sense of SELF gets in the way or as
the Bible describes it, our FLESH.
A lot of us gain our sense of identity
based on our family background, work, even human relationships. In our social media crazed world, we can
easily attach our personal worth and let it rise or fall based on the # of
likes we receive on our pictures or posts.
GET
ROOTED IN CHRIST
Ephesians 1:11 In him we were also chosen, having
been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in
conformity with the purpose of his will, 12 in order that we, who were the
first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. 13 And
you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the
gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a
seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our
inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the
praise of his glory.
In Christ we are SIGNIFICANT, it is the
purpose of his well, In Christ,
Our identity is SECURE, we are included. In
Christ, the HS is your guarantee, you are God’s possession. He is saying, I OWN YOU.
We are SUFFICIENT, we are sealed with the
promised Holy Spirit
It was God the Father who said of Jesus
“this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” before He even began his
public ministry.
Your identity in Christ is so important to
grasp because it will shape the motives for why you serve.
Identity
precedes activity – who I am in Christ comes before what I do for Christ.
Steven Furtick
And the flipside, without Christ we can do
nothing, without Christ, we will always fall short and without Christ, we will
continue to doubt ourselves.
Don’t sell yourself SHORT
ASK
FOR MORE
Check out The BIG ASK! Going for it with our prayer requests
16 I have not stopped giving thanks for
you, remembering you in my prayers. 17 I keep asking that the God of our Lord
Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and
revelation, so that you may know him better. 18 I pray that the eyes of
your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he
has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, 19
and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as
the mighty strength 20 he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and
seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms
First and foremost we need to be able to be
rich in confidence and assurance of who we are and what is ours in order to
bring wisdom, insight, hope and meaning to others.
• The
Spirit of wisdom- insight into the true nature of things, the ability to make
decisions that reflect the heart of God
Can you identify a time when God gave you
the Spirit of wisdom about yourself or a situation that God placed you in?
•
The Spirit of revelation – the
communication of God to your soul, it is an uncovering, the ability to unveil. It is the spiritual power of insight is only
because of the gift of the Holy Spirit.
This is where prayer can become very exciting and bring incredible
confirmation into people’s lives.
A simple prayer I pray that incorporates
this is, “Father, give me eyes to see
what You want me to see and ears to hear what You want me to hear.”
Can you identify a time when God gave you a
Spirit of revelation into your own life or another person’s life or a time when
the love of God was revealed to you in a unique way?
This summer, our daughter Addi was accepted
with YWAM, a 6 month youth discipleship training and missions ministry. She worked hard at roofing alongside her
brothers and me as well as doing her landscaping job. Sharon and my mom also came alongside her to
do fundraising through selling plants for the missions portion of her
trip. So, the first phase was due the
other week and it was $3300- in total.
The amount she raised through working and fundraising was $3280 +$50-
that just happened to be coming in that same day through another plant
sale! God is so good!!
Speaking about identity...fun fact for all my new friends at Crossings who made it to the end of my blog, I was the newspaper carrier of the month back in the day...1979, to be exact. I actually kept that paper route for 7 years!!
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