Chi Alpha's annual "winter camp" was this weekend! =) It was great, as usual. Our verse for the weekend was 2 Corinthians 5:17-21.
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ.
And on the drive back to Pullman today, I wrote this little reflection as I thought about what I'd been pondering. Lots of talk about identity, and things like that, and the idea of having our identity solidified in Christ. Considering other things that were going on this weekend...I need to post it as much as a reminder to myself as to uplift anyone else.
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Your innocent blood, has washed
my guilty life.
In Your presence, God, I’m
completely satisfied.
For You, I sing, I dance. Rejoice
in this divine romance.
What does that look
like? That which is complete satisfaction in the presence of God? Leaving
everything else that I think defines me, that I have come to depend on for joy
or for validation behind, in order to truly say that I am satisfied in Him. How
often have I heard the songs which claim that God is enough…more than
enough…all I need…etc., and yet I continue to keep parts of the world on the
side.
It isn’t always “bad
stuff”. In fact, it’s rarely “bad stuff”. Things which I can almost forget are
becoming part of my identity, part of what I use to define myself. It’s grades,
and school, and praise from teachers. It’s being able to stand in front of a
class of people and feel confident that I am competent. It’s the secret part of
me that revels in recognition from other people. It’s a desire for a
relationship. It’s the need to be constantly pushing myself to be better. It’s
the way that I seek friendships and interactions with non-believers. It’s the
way that I talk about God among my Christian friends. It’s the moral standards
that I adhere to.
Is this a negative
identity? Not really. Aren’t these aspects of my personality and character
God-given? Certainly, they are. But when did anything that God gave me become
“mine”? I am not the gifts that I have been given. ‘I’ am nothing. If I have
anything at all to offer the world, it is going to be found in Christ. It is going
to be driven by the Spirit. My physical or spiritual “resume” doesn’t
matter. My worth is not found in
those things. My worth is found in the One who calls me worthy.
Satisfaction. What
does it look like for me to have actually found satisfaction in He who loves me
above anything else? Why am I afraid to let the only definition of myself be
Christ? These fears of losing myself in Him are so unfounded. He’s going to
catch me. He’s going to prove faithful, if I just let go. There’s such peace in
the fleeting moments when I do. In these times of worship and reflection where
my heart releases its grip on the flesh, and allows my spirit to cry out in
praise and openness to the King, I have had a taste of what satisfaction is. I
have experienced the overwhelming joy and contentment. Can I not have that at
every moment? Can I not live in such a way where my romancer is always at the
foreground of my thoughts?
Where do I begin…to
change this cycle of mistaken identity and misplaced satisfaction, in things
that fail and do not last? I can’t do this on my strength alone.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it.
Prone to leave the One I love.
Here’s my heart, oh take and seal
it. Seal it for Thy courts above.
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* So Big, Iyaz
