“The key to a healthy and holy identity is believing that you are who God says you are. Believing yourself to be anything les than who God says isn’t doing anyone any favors. Including you.”- Mark Batterson
“The LORD your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.”- Zephaniah 3:17 (NIV)
As Mark Batterson continues Chapter 5 of Double Blessing, he asserts that the priestly blessing is tangible and relatable, not abstract. Furthermore, if you lack a revelation of God’s love, you’ll relate to God out of fear rather than affection. Because if you relate to God out of fear, Pastor Batterson notes, that represents as far as you can get from the heart of God.
A. W. Tozer once described the most important thing about us as what comes to our mind when we think about God. Therefore, Mark queries:
“So let me ask the question, What comes to mind? Is there an angry expression on His face? Or does the heavenly Father have smile lines around His eye? Is He recoiling with arms crossed? Or is He reaching out with arms wide open?”
However, Pastor Batterson cautions, so many of us give up on God when someone we love or trust lets us down. Above all, Mark contends, it’s not healthy to project human failings onto God. As the chapter title indicates, when that happens you end up with “God in the Hands of Angry People.”
Finally, in a speech at the National Prayer Breakfast, author Eric Metaxas shared his thought on this subject:
“Everything I had rejected about God was actually not God. It was just dead religion. . . . It was people who go to church and do not share the love of Jesus. . . people who don’t practice what they preach, people who are indifferent to the poor and suffering. . . . I had rejected that, but guess what? Jesus had also rejected that. . . . Jesus was and is the enemy of dead religion.”
Today’s question: What Scriptures provide the key to a healthy and holy identity? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Ritual reminders of God’s blessings”