OUR IDENTITY IN CHRIST
God Is in the process of preparing his people so that they will be able to navigate their way through all that is about to be released and so today the Lord has given me another chapter in His calling for us to ‘Get Ready’.
The enemy has been about the business of attacking humanity and the Lord is calling us to pay attention. He wants us to take note of where there is weakness so that we will be prepared to know how to withstand against his attacks.
Last week a word was spoken that I felt I was to pay attention to. It was that the next 7 years are going to be years filled with the outflow of the awesome power of the Lord in like anything we have ever seen.
The Lord has revealed to us that we are standing only holy ground. He has told us that Now is the time. He shared a word with us so that we would be clear about the nature of sin and how it affects us in our daily lives. He shared that he wants us as his people to be willing to tear down any of the high places that may remain in our lives and last month He revealed to us the importance of understanding the difference between the wisdom of God and the wisdom of man.
He has been revealing all of this because He is readying us for what lies directly ahead.
The Dream
A couple of weeks ago, one of the ladies in a Canadian discipleship group I lead had a dream where she saw a picture of a lion and Pig. They were fighting over a collar that the pig had but the lion wanted to take away. The Collar was like the collar of a minister of the church, and the Lord was showing me that as a holy priesthood we have a very high given identity. In that Identity we have great strength in the Lord service but many are unaware of their true identity and before they wake up to the enemy would like to steal it.
I remembered the picture from the story of Gideon where the angel declared that Gideon was to go in the strength that he had. In this hour when the Lord is moving out by his spirit all around the world we are being called to go in the strength that we have but to do that we have to know who we are.
Scripture tells us to be strong in the Lord. (Eph 6:10). But that often can be difficult if we don’t know who it is that we’ve been created to be. For example if I am not clear about who I am then I will not be clear about my purpose in life.
Have you ever wondered why does the word of God go to such lengths to lay out the geneology of families. Why was it important to know that they were sons of Abraham. Why did it matter that they should know that were of the lineage of David. Why did the geneology of Jesus matter so much that readers of scripture would be so clear. The answer is that the need for us to understand our identity has been laid into our dna. It was inbred by God. It matters that we know where we belong and who we belong to. It matters that we know our heritage. We feel stronger when we know that are part of a family.
Being part of a family suggest that there are others who have our back, others who care for us and who are ready to defend us in times of trouble. When a battle was to be waged the tribes would call out to those of their own tribe, brothers and cousins and relatives to stand together to defend against the enemy, and in the same way God has always gone to great lengths to make a point of identifying those who belong to the family of God.
In the story of Gideon. We read about a man for who had been fitted for a mantle, a spiritual cloak that had been made for him in the sewing rooms of heaven. Gideon had been born to be a leader of men. A soldier, but when faced with the of who God had created him to be …. he was not able to take hold of it. Gideon saw himself as belonging to the least of all the tribes and he saw himself to be the least of his family.
Gideon had no idea who he had been born to be.
Too many of us are just like Gideon ….we have no idea of our identity. We don’t believe what God has told us about who it is that we’ve been created to be and for too much of our lives we struggle to take hold of the mantle that the Lord has created for us. The story of Gideon is the story of one of God’s children going in search of his identity. Like Gideon, discovering our identity doesn’t always come easy and sometimes God has to create circumstances to bring us to that place where we will finally begin to clue in.
Not about immorality but about Identity.
Recently I found myself chatting with two friends who had decided to take their child out of school because of the whole issue of gender awareness. They were offended at what was being taught in the classroom and so they decided that it was time to take a stand.
Today, children all around the world are being raised in a culture that is challenging them question who they are. They are being encouraged to question who they have been created to be and it is confusing them at a most basic level.
My friends decided that they needed to take a stand even though so often it seems as though we are going against the crowd because so many of the rest of the world are accepting this change in direction.
Why is this happening? It is happening because is our enemy, the devil, knows that if he can confuse us about who we are in Christ, then he will not have any difficulty overcoming us when the real battle begins to rage.
He is doing two things by undermining our identity :
First: By causing us to question our identity when the battle begins we will find ourselves standing alone and unprotected.
In addition we will feel that we have no idea of our purposes in life. Without a purpose where is the reason for our existence. Nothing matters, nothing will seem worth protecting. That’s why we read so much in the bible about belonging to the family of God. When as we read in Ecclessiastes we get to the place where it seems that life is meaningless the enemy will have no difficulty overcoming us.
Stripped of our identity we are stripped of our strength. We are stripped of our sense of being and easy pray for any enemy to destroy.
The enemy attacks the children knowing that if he can disarm them, then future generations will be easy to overcome because they will have no idea how to stand against his attacks. Satan knows that using this strategy, the battle will be won before it begins.
A heavenly model and being fully alive!
When it comes to identity, we actually have a heavenly model. When Moses asked God what His name is God answered … I AM who I am. There could be no more declarative statement. God is beyond time. God is beyond placing in a space. God is greater than any quantity that we attempt to place around him. God is the great I m and He leaves no doubt as to His identity.
Would such an all knowing God have created children who would be any less sure about their own identity.
Jesus taught that glory came to him as he enabled others to come to know the father. In the same way, the Lord wants us to bring glory to the Father. What better way to do that than to share the truth of God as we find it in his word, father and the first truth that we ought to share is the whole truth about who it is that we have been created to be.
We have a responsibility …. It’s our purpose ……. To know who we were created to be and to share it. And by doing it bring glory to god.
People who know who they are present themselves as confident, self assured, people. They are more fully alive when they know who it is that we have been created to be. Have you noticed that people who have purpose and have a passion for life seem to be more alive. When there is no doubt as to our purpose in life, we dive in with both feet to go after it in order to fulfill that purpose.
This is what St. Iraneus meant when he said to give glory to God is to be fully alive, but, to be fully alive we need to know who it is that we have been created to be.
Satan is very calculating. He has known that to attack the children of God at this level will weaken God’s people. That’s why he’s going for the children. If our children are raised not to know who they are it’s not likely that we’ll step into life with any confidence and they will be non-starters in any battle. It’s the enemies scheme to defeat God’s people before ever the battle begins.
What the word of God says about who we are created to be.
Like Abraham we have been given a new name. He is Abraham, not Abram because he was now the ‘Father of many’. Jacob was given a new name Israel; because he wrestled with God and lived. We too have been given the name Christians, denoting that we have a part to play in God’s plan for redemption as “Christ Ones’ and as followers of the son of God we have a very clear identity.
As Christians we are:
Chosen. No accident. 1 Peter 2:9
Authorized and empowered. Jesus sends us out prepared Lk 9:1 ; Mt 10:1
Those who know his secrets. We have access to God’s presence. 1 Cor 2:10
We are able to hear His voice. Jn 10:27,28
We are created to be light in the darkness Jn 8:12
Shielded by God’s power against whatever the enemy may bring . 1 Pet 1:5
Marked by God for his purposes as his people ( Eze 9:4; Rev 3:12; Eph 1:13,14)
Created to do good works … planned in advance for us to do Eph 2:10
Living stones … in a spiritual house , not alone with an army of many 1 Pet 2:5
Confident …. A confidence that comes from our knowledge of God 2 Cor 5:6-17
We are favoured by God Ps 5:12
A part of God’s family, Rom 8:16
No wonder the enemy doesn’t want us to know who we are. Such a people will be a mighty force to be reckoned with.
Why is the enemy attacking the family of God in this way. Because God is about to release His
power in ways that will amaze us. He is about to shake the foundations of the world by his Spirit’s presence and He will use his people to recognize what is happening so that we can be confident in His purpose and our role as his ambassadors. But … if his people are to be an effective force …. they need to know who they are so that they respond in strength.
God has prepared many to be his forerunners in order to equip the many that are about to be brought in as new recruits. These new believers will have need of mentors to guide them.
Why did the angel tell Gideon to ‘Go in the strength you have’. … because as a part of the family of God we need to know where our strength lies. There is strength in belonging to God’s family …. But we have to believe it
God is going to use us as his spiritual search and rescue teams so that those among the body who are feeling lost and on the verge of drowning will be able to find a life line to cling onto as the spirit in them begins to rise. As they come into the awareness of who it is they have been created to be….. they too will become a force to be reckoned with.
In closing
To know who we are in Christ is to know that we are called as enablers, able to equip others in the faith that we have …. so that they too will be able to take their place as warriors in this fight for truth.
Knowing our identity, provides us with confidence.
When we Know our identities we know our rights.
To know who we are in Christ is to recognize that our identity is clearly declared throughout scripture and that we are called to be about the business of discovering our identity and stepping into it.
To know who we are in Christ is to recognize that the enemy fears that we wake up to the reality of our identity and so he will do all that he can to keep us confused so that we will be too weak to resist his attacks.
To know who we are in Christ is to know that we are living stones in a spiritual house …. that not even the gates of hell will be able to withstand.
That’s why we need to be really clear about our identity in Christ.
