Identity

 

 

I want us to take a good look at the subject of identity this morning and to explore what that means and where that comes from.

 

So as a little exercise to start with I have put some paper and pens on the middle tables and I'd like to invite you to write down a few words about how you describe yourself. So if you are near the pens and paper, please could you pass those down the rows and start writing some words.You've got about 30 seconds. This is totally for you, I am not going to ask you to do anything with it, no- one is going to look at it unless you choose to show them.

 

OK. thank you for doing that. Hang on to those and think about them as we go on this morning.

 

The Bible encourages us to really know ourselves. Paul wrote to the Romans and said,

 

  "The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what He does for us, not by what we are and what we do for Him." The Message

 

My aim for this morning is that you go away with this sound truth: that God wants you to know that whatever you do, whatever others say about you, whatever you look like, whatever has happened to you in the past, whatever culture dictates, the primary, most important thing to know is that you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.

 

As many of you know, last April my husband Ben and I led the church for 4 months whilst David and Alison took a well deserved sabbatical. Ben took a sabbatical from his job at BT so he could do this and we had a great time and really enjoyed the whole season.

At the end of the 4 months we went away with David and Alison and we talked about the future, what the Lord was saying and how He had spoken over the sabbatical time. It was clear that we were to stay in Leeds and David and Alison asked us to be their associates which we agreed to. So, all fine and dandy you would think. However God was just beginning a work in me that I think God wants me to share this with you this morning - as we learn to walk humbly with Him.

For as Ben went back to BT, David and Alison resumed their Senior Pastor role, I felt like I was in a place that I had never been in before which left me very down. Questions of Who am I? Was that it? What is my identity rooted in? My confidence was at a low I had never experienced before, I was crying a lot, moments of joy seemed few and far between and I was also getting bad headaches. Yet God was really at work in me.

 

So I started to read a bit about a chap called Gideon who I think is brilliant. You can read about his story in the book of Judges which is towards the beginning of the Bible.

 

To give you some context to the passage I'm going to to share with you this morning, Gideon lived at a time when Israel had been disobedient to God and so the Israelites spent their days hiding in shelters, caves and mountain strongholds, while the Miidianites and Amalakites dominated their country.

 

Israel had a real sense of national identity and perhaps the reason for this was because the people owed their very birth and ongoing existence to the intervention of God, or who they called Yahweh. They believed He was their rescuer and their deliverer and they were a chosen people.

 

John Bright, in his book "The History of Israel" says "It is clear that from the earliest times, Israel saw herself as a people chosen by Yahweh and the object of his special favour"

 

Now in this passage, the Israelites were feeling crushed and humiliated. They were meant to be the ones spreading out and occupying the land, reaping the fruit of God's favour but they had been worshipping other gods and behaving in a way that offended Yahweh.

 

So let's begin reading at Judges chapter 6 and verse 11 where God meets with the young Gideon, an Israelite who sees himself as a non - entity, a nobody.

 

One day the angel of God came and sat down under the oak in Ophrah that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, whose son Gideon was threshing wheat in the winepress, out of sight of the Midianites. The angel of God appeared to him and said, "God is with you, O mighty warrior!"

 

Gideon replied, "With me, my master? If God is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all the miracle-wonders our parents and grandparents told us about, telling us, 'Didn't God deliver us from Egypt?' The fact is, God has nothing to do with us—he has turned us over to Midian."

 

But God faced him directly: "Go in this strength that is yours. Save Israel from Midian. Haven't I just sent you?"

 

Gideon said to him, "Me, my master? How and with what could I ever save Israel? Look at me. My clan's the weakest in Manasseh and I'm the runt of the litter."

 

God said to him, "I'll be with you. Believe me, you'll defeat Midian as one man."

 

So we find Gideon and some other Israelites doing the back breaking work of beating wheat in the family winepress.  Now, hearing how they were beating wheat in a winepress would have made the later Israelite audience snigger. Everyone would have known that you beat wheat in the most open place possible, preferably on top of a hill, so you can hurl the beaten wheat into the air and let the wind carry away the chaff, and you are left with a nice stack of pure wheat. In contrast, a winepress is a small structure, built in some sheltered place, where you can tread the grapes and let the pure juice flow down into the collecting basin. Crushing wheat in a winepress is bonkers but it shows how scared and crushed the Israelites were- they had to do this in secret or the Midianites would steal all the harvest.

 

Let's take a deeper look at the one God visits, let's look at Gideon:

 

He is not the earnest faced intercessor- facial muscles locked in serious, pious concentration as he performs acts of religious devotion. He's a bored, frustrated labourer stamping around tearfully in the winepress, doing ordinary stuff.  He was run of the mill, nothing special, just like the rest.

 

Yet Hebrews describes Gideon as a 'hero of the faith' and I find it incredibly comforting when we read how these great heroes of the faith are just normal, flesh and blood like the rest of us. Ben and I were having a conversation last January with a friend of ours who I consider a bit of a 'hero of the faith'. He told us of his struggles, how God was challenging him and it was strangely comforting because it showed he was normal like the rest of us!

 

We can see that Gideon had a poor self image, he confessed that to the angel. Most of us will experience a challenge to our identity at some point in our lives and it is particularly common when a change happens and continuity stops. Here are some circumstances I could think of:

 

•   Children have left home

•   A relationship has ended

•   A job change or redundancy

•   Having children

•   Changes in friendships

•   Getting older and we don't look the same as we did

•   Relocating

•   Retirement

•   The housegroup you have been in closes

•   A church plant starts

•   Bereavement

 

So let's look at some of the blocks our identity is sometimes built on.

 

Are we what we do?

 

It is vital that we have something that we can 'do'. The psychologist, Swann names the two basic components of self esteem as being:

 

A feeling of being loved

A feeling of being competent

 

Of course we need to feel appreciated, to have a sense of personal achievement or play a role that is appreciated by others. People place a high value on achievement which means that people are made to feel inadequate failures when they are not apparently succeeding. Even those with a mundane job can feel belittled when people ask the question, "What do you do?"

 

Gideon did not appear to have much self esteem and this may be linked to his lack of achievement. Threshing wheat was not a very prestigious job to be doing, nor one that he could take much pride in, except that he may have managed to keep wheat needed for the family out of the thieving hands of the enemy.

 

Perhaps there are some of you here this morning who find themselves in similar circumstances? What you do brings you little satisfaction. Maybe you feel like a frustrated failure or have a sense of uselessness?

 

Remember that whatever you do, you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.

 

 

Am I what culture dictates?

 

The culture Gideon grew up in was not as God intended - instead of Israel being a blessing to the people around them, they were living in fear of their neighbours and subject to constant attack. But, in the depths of despair people were crying out to God. Gideon's self view was not as a worshipper of Yahweh, a son of Abraham, but as a weak and insignificant nobody.

 

What culture were you born into? Where were you born and what effect has that had upon you?

 

We live in a society where you are looked upon highly if you have progressed up the career ladder and you have the big house to go with it. Materialism is an accepted way of life and shopping is the new pastime.

 

The current work culture means that frequent redundancy and job insecurity lead us to question our identity.

 

Dr Arch Hart, a psychologist I like, talks about how individuals are more likely to feel devalued and empty in this present culture. He says "because the self feels empty it needs to be filled up and soothed with food, gadgets, music, celebrities, alcohol, drugs."

 

Do you find yourself striving at work for the big house and the big pay check because you find your identity in those things?

 

Remember that, whatever culture dictates, the primary, most important thing to know is you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.

 

Am I what others say about me?

 

Like Gideon, we have all spent many years listening to the voices of others telling us what we are like. First, and most influential, must be our parents. Close after that would probably be relatives and then perhaps teachers. At the same time we probably have friends and peers adding their contribution to the mix.

 

I remember when I was about 9, a girl used to come round to play at our house. We had nothing in common and, in my very immature 9 year olds brain, she was a total bore. My brother, Paul, however entertained her. I clearly remember my Mum saying to the girls parents, "Paul's the one who is good with children." Interestingly, I heard that. A little digression, I know, but parents when you are talking to other adults, please speak of your children highly- they love to overhear you praising them to others.

 

 

There is no doubt that these comments over the years will have contributed to the way we see ourselves. If the comments and care are kind and fair, we are left with a sense of personal worth. If they are demeaning or care-less our sense of self worth is at rock bottom.

 

It may be worth looking at the list I asked you to do earlier about how you view yourself. How many of those words are a result of what someone has said to you?

 

Remember that whatever others say about you, you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.

 

Am I what I look like?

 

We do not know what Gideon looked like but we do know that he saw himself as "the runt of the litter".

 

Our physical bodies are as much of us as our minds and our feelings, and how we treat them and clothe them says a lot about the way we feel about ourselves. I love the way Jesus brings balance in a world where every magazine tells us to look a certain way.  He says:

 

 

"Has anyone by fussing in front of the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch? All this time and money wasted on fashion—do you think it makes that much difference? Instead of looking at the fashions, walk out into the fields and look at the wildflowers. They never primp or shop, but have you ever seen colour and design quite like it? The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them.

 

"If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don't you think he'll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I'm trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God's giving. People who don't know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don't worry about missing out. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

 

Sadly, people imagine that if they can make their bodies fit the latest cultural image they will feel better about themselves.

 

What image are you trying to project through your appearance?

 

Remember that whatever you look like, you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.

 

And then God comes

 

Gideon's poor opinion of himself would have remained the same had the angel of the Lord not intruded into his life. The angel appeared and said to Gideon: ' The Lord is with you, mighty warrior'. For a moment, Gideon must have looked around to see who the angel was addressing.  He would not have recognised himself addressed in this way. 'Mighty Warrior' did not seem to fit at all. It was not a title that fit with his negative self-view. But the angel had not made a mistake. You see God saw him differently and although Gideon took some persuading, he did eventually become the warrior God saw him to be.

 

I think there are a few things we can do to see what God sees in us:

 

1. Ask the Holy Spirit to come.

 

The simple prayer that we treasure so deeply. Ask the Holy Spirit, God's helper, to reveal the truth to our hearts and speak to us about who we really are. Then explore what He says.

 

Gideon had heard the angel but then he spent days testing what he had heard. It wasn't an immediate change of perception. I think we must do the same. To build our eternal identity, which will outweigh and outlast our temporal one, we first have to sense God speaking to us. Then we have to build on what we have heard.

 

2. Forgive others

 

It may be that you need to forgive those who have caused you to think the way you do about yourself. This may be one of the hardest things you do. The weird thing is that we often feel like punishing the people who have hurt us, but God says to forgive. Maybe this morning you could pray with your housegroup leader and begin that journey.

 

3. Say sorry to God

 

Looking at the piece of paper you wrote things down on at the beginning, it may be interesting to see how many things are positive and how many are negative.

 

I spoke earlier of how after the sabbatical I was in a place where I was very down. I couldn't think of one thing about myself that was positive. People I trusted told me how much they appreciated this or that about me but I just didn't quite believe it even though I wanted to. So it came to a point when I had to repent of believing lies about myself. Those thought processes had come from believing that I was only worthy if I achieved- I had to repent of believing the lie that my identity was rooted in what I did and that God would be much more pleased with me if I achieved.  Interestingly as soon as I did that, the headaches stopped immediately and my joy was restored.

 

So it may be that, like me, you need to repent for believing lies about yourself. Some things are simply not true.

 

God has also spoken to me massively over the last year. One morning he took me to a passage in Genesis, right at the beginning of the Bible. God is referred to by many names in Genesis- in Genesis 16 Hagar recognises God as El Roi, "The God who looks for me", in Genesis 17, Yahweh appeared to Abraham as El Shadday. The particular bit that the Holy Spirit led me to one morning was when Abraham referred to God as El Olam.  It's difficult to provide an English equivalent but Olam means something like 'the age' or 'ages'.

For Abraham to call Yahweh El Olam was to say that as far back as could be imagined Yahweh has been God. He has been acutely involved with Abraham's life and that Yahweh will be God and will be with Abraham as far into the future as can be imagined.  He is God Forever. I felt the Holy Spirit was saying that He was my El Olam- that He has been with me and will be with me for eternity. This is the only reference to El Olam in the Old Testament and it has become a deeply personal name that I use for God most often in worship.

 

That leads me onto my next point:

 

 

4. Continue to listen

 

What is God saying to you?

 

For most of us, it is unlikely that we will be threshing wheat in a winepress and be confronted by an angelic presence.  We need to be in a position to hear God speaking. If we are attentive we will hear what God longs for us to hear- who we really are in His eyes and He will show you who He is to you too.

 

When the Lord speaks He comes with compassion, truth and an intimacy that is staggering.

 

 

5. Growth in the compost

 

Tri Robinson leads Boise Vineyard in America and he encourages us in his books to take a look at the plants and trees and note that most of their growth takes place in the compost. If this morning you are in a place of figuring out who you are and you feel like you are in the dark compost, be comforted because there is more than likely to be growth going on. God is at work in you. Interestingly for leaders too, God often puts you in leadership to grow you, so don't be surprised when this happens.

 

6. Get to know Jesus more

 

When we come to know Jesus, our image is restored and we can reflect the Lord's glory. If you don't know Jesus this morning, I would encourage you to get to know Him. To hear what He thinks and says about you is something not to be missed. I know it will be like music to your ears.

 

Here are a few truths:

 

"But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God"  1Peter 2:9

 

"You are the people of God, He loved you and chose you for his own" Colossians 3:12

 

"There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" Romans 8:1

 

I'd also encourage you to read the whole of Romans chapter 6, there are some great truths in there.

 

Gideon would have remained a frightened man if he had not heard the message of the angel. God had seen Him and recognised something in him that Gideon had not even suspected about himself.

 

So to finish, when you look again at what you have written on your piece of paper or when you hear yourself saying "I'm just this" or "I'm not very that" or when you feel yourself sinking as you compare yourself with others, I would encourage you to:

 

1.     Ask the Holy Spirit to come

2.     Forgive others

3.    Say sorry to God

4.     Continue to listen

5.     Growth in the compost

6.     Get to know Jesus more

 

And my prayer for you is that whatever you do, whatever others say about you, whatever you look like, whatever has happened to you in the past, whatever culture dictates may you know that you are God's and you are chosen and loved by Him.