In his Introduction to Part 2 (“Identity: Who We Are”) of Transformed, Caesar Kalinowski asks us to imagine performing as a one-person trapeze act. Obviously, it doesn’t work- we’d need a partner to catch us. Similarly, our new identity in Christ is lived both individually and collectively (as the church). Pastor Kalinowski states that the four key expressions of our identity- family, missionary, servant, disciple- overlap and blend together. They are all part of our one true identity in Christ.
The author then begins Chapter 3 (“Family”) by stating that God always has desired an earthly family that would witness to what He truly is like. Yet we, like the people of Israel in the Old Testament, often seem to be more concerned with preserving our own image than God’s, focusing on our priorities rather than God’s glory- as Francis Chan and Danae Yankowski explain in Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God:
“The irony is that while God doesn’t need us but still wants us, we desperately need God but don’t really want Him most of the time. He treasures us . . . and we wonder, indifferently, how much we have to do for him to get by.”
At times we’ve all tried to manage life and relationships for our personal comfort and benefit or, conversely, have found ourselves on the outside looking in. We wonder if things will ever change. But when we live out our identity as God’s family, we offer that very identity to a waiting and watching world.
Today’s question: Following your vocation loss, have you found solace or stigma in your family of faith? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Safe or dangerous?” (from Mark Batterson’s latest book, All In)
