Identity
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What is your Identity in Christ?
If I’m honest, for most of my walk with Christ (I’m talking decades), I didn’t really understand what identity in Christ meant. To be fair, no one really explained it to me and I was not motivated enough to figure it out on my own. If you would have asked me, I would have said, “Yeah, I know what that means. I’m confident my identity is rooted in Christ.” But really, I had no idea.
Until a few years ago when several things changed in my life, I was brought to a place of not knowing who or what I was because the things I found my identity in had been taken away or lost. And it was during this time that it felt like the Lord was inviting me into truly understanding and embracing who I really was. My identity in Him.
It changed everything.
If you’re new here, welcome! 😊 Check out some of my other blog posts where I unpack more of what it has been like to understand, embrace, and begin to truly live out my identity in Christ.
But today, I want to share a resource with you that helps simplify and unpack what your identity in Christ is. In this resource, there are 7 aspects of your identity in Christ all based on Scripture.
Friend, you were created to fully live out your identity in Christ. But you have to start with understanding what your identity in Christ actually means and encompasses. Here’s a starting place. Grab this free resource. There are even cards you can print and post so that you can be reminded daily of your identity in Christ. 🫶🏼
Click the image above and I will send this resource straight to your inbox. I’m praying this is helpful and encouraging. One step at a time. We’re in this together!
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His Favor in the Taking Away
I heard a statement the other day by a speaker/author I love and it stopped me in my tracks.
“There could be something God has taken out of your life that you think is a punishment, but it’s actually a privilege. That thing was making you think you weren’t thirsty anymore. ‘I’m taking it because you won’t leave it.’ That is the favor of God.”
Jada EdwardsOver the last few years, there have been a few things that have ended in my life. One I chose to end, another that ended abruptly, and another that just kind of dwindled away.
Each time, it felt like a significant loss. Each time, I questioned if it was the “right thing”. Each time I felt like I had somehow failed or wasn’t enough. Each time, I wondered if there would be a “next thing” that would fill me, give my life purpose.
And although it took months, even years after at least one of them, I came to realize that each loss, each ending, was God’s care for me. It was Him loving me and keeping me close to Himself. And what I now realize after hearing the quote I mentioned earlier is that in each of these losses, these endings, it was God’s favor upon me.
Let me explain a bit more…
The first loss was about 4 years ago when I decided to leave my 13-year, public school teaching career. In all honesty, this was something I felt led to do at least a year before I finally worked up the courage to actually do it. The main reason it was so hard to leave that career was because that was one of the main ways I defined myself and found my purpose and value. I was not sure who I would be if I wasn’t a public school teacher.
The second loss was about 3 years ago when I abruptly was let go from a position working in a local, Christian non-profit. After leaving teaching, I didn’t necessarily think I would find a new job as quickly as I found this one. But as soon as it came on my radar, I knew it was something I wanted to pursue. It was beyond anything I had done before, but it felt like it naturally fit with how I was wired and what stirred my heart. Unfortunately, it quickly became clear that this was not a healthy work environment and not a place where I could grow and learn. And almost a year into working there, I was abruptly let go with the explanation that I was not a “good fit” for the position.
Even though this felt like a great loss and even injustice, the Lord’s care and love following that was undeniable. But even this loss made me question my identity, my value, and my purpose.
The third loss was more of a slow, natural end to a blessed opportunity the Lord provided to care for our family financially. Even though I knew this ending was coming, it still made me question what I was doing, what I was suppose to be doing, and where I would find my value.
Within the last year and a half, through a lot of deep heart transformation and reflection, I have come to know, love, and trust God in ways I have never experienced in my decades walking with Him.
Each of these losses or endings were hard, but deeply necessary. After God continued to work on my heart and meet me in the reflection, He showed and taught me 5 major things:
- In each loss, there was nothing wrong with me. This was all part of His plan.
- My value and identity was never anchored in what I did, but it was always rooted in Him.
- He needed to take each of these things away from me to draw me to Himself. To take away the things that I found my identity and worth in apart from Him.
- He needed to take these things away from me to free me to be the woman He created me to be. Deeply rooted in Him. Trusting Him more than anyone or anything else. And desperate for Him to meet my needs, because He is the only One who can.
- Finally, He needed to take these things away so that I could learn and be transformed knowing that He is always enough and I don’t have to be. I could finally stop striving and actually rest in Him.
Friend, sometimes we need God to take something away from us because we can’t do it ourselves. He’s never looking to punish us, but instead He is always caring for and loving us in a way that brings glory to His name and transforms our hearts and minds to reflect His more fully. And in the taking away, He is freeing us from anything that is preventing or distracting us from living the full, abundant life He desires for us. When he takes something away, He is not trying to hurt us but rather He is freeing us to become more healthy and whole in Him. It’s a gift. It is His favor upon us.
I didn’t see it right away after each of these losses. The realization and transformation came slowly. (He’s so good like that.) But today, I am more sure of my identity in Him than I ever have been. I have more trust in Him than anyone or anything else. And I feel free from striving because I am so confident that He is enough and I don’t have to be. I wouldn’t give up this transformation, freedom, and dependence on Him for anything in the world. And I journey into the future knowing that all open and closed doors are part of His plan and purpose for His glory and my good. 🫶🏼
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Preserving Your Growth
It usually takes me a while to realize and recognize my own personal and spiritual growth. Often God uses either a close friend or a situation to show me how He has or is transforming me.
My tendency is to be my own worst critic. Even the times I may recognize an area of growth, I tend to quickly talk myself out of it or give myself reasons why it probably isn’t really growth, certainly not on a heart level.
Within the last year, I’ve come to realize how insulting that must be to God. He is the One who cares and loves me enough to even bring about transformation and growth. And then I have the audacity to downplay it or even talk it away. I have also come to realize that when I do this, I stunt my further growth in these areas because I can’t even honestly assess and accept the transformation I have already experienced.
I’ve gotta think that countless times, God must look at me and lovingly shake his head thinking, “Oh daughter, let me try another approach to show you how much I’m transforming you.” 💟
And then a situation arises like the one that happened the other day and I am forced (in a good way) to see the transformation God is doing in my heart and mind. And this time, He used my husband to help me see it.
Let me explain…
A new opportunity recently surfaced and God made it clear that I should walk through the open door and see what He had in store. So, I am in the process of doing just that.
But in preparation for a meeting involving this new opportunity, I had reached out to a friend to ask a few questions to make sure I had my information straight before attending the meeting.
Now on paper, this seems like a harmless activity. Some would even say it was a smart idea to reach out to this friend to acquire information But it wasn’t the activity itself that was harmful, it was the motive behind it that showcased an area of growth that was being threatened. An opportunity to easily revert to an old pattern of thinking and behaving in an effort to make myself feel more adequate, to prove I was enough, and to present myself as knowing more than I really did.
When this friend did not return my text before the scheduled meeting, I slightly freaked out.
The meeting ended up needing to be rescheduled which provided an unexpected opportunity to reflect, one that was spoken into by my husband.
As I was venting to him about my frustration with my friend who did not respond to my text message to give me the information I was seeking, he pointed out that this in fact was God’s care for me.
I initially was like, “Excuse me?!”
And then as he explained, it took a matter of moments for me to realize how right he was.
God saved me (and preserved my growth) in not allowing me to connect with my friend to acquire the ever-so-important information I “needed” to be ready for the meeting. God had been transforming my heart and mind to be able to fully embrace and live out my identity in Him. And He had been freeing me from relying on accomplishments, positions, or knowledge to make me feel important, sufficient, and enough. He had been freeing me from trying to prove myself rather than abide in my identity in Christ and embrace the knowledge, gifts, and skills He had already given me.
It’s not that acquiring new or needed information is, in and of itself, a bad idea. However, when the motives are to make myself look better, puff up my pride, and present myself as something or someone I am not, then it’s not a good idea for me. The acquiring of this information (which in full honesty was not necessary to have a productive meeting) would have intentionally taken my dependence off from God and onto myself. In essence I would have been saying, “Lord, I recognize you opened this door and provided this opportunity (just as I am), but I’m going to take it from here. I’m not sure what you’ve given me, the experiences I have had, and the way you’ve wired me is enough.”
That day, God spoke through my husband to remind me that my identity in Christ is solid. I do not need to strive to be more or know more in order to be enough for an opportunity He was providing. And frankly if that changed in the future and there was some new learning He wanted me to pursue, He would make that clear. But it wouldn’t be from a place of inadequacy or striving.
Maybe you’re like me and don’t easily recognize or embrace the growth and transformation God has done in you. If so, let’s thank and praise the God we love for so gently and patiently using people and situations in our lives to show us what He’s done and to help us preserve that growth for His glory.
I’m a work in progress for sure, but I want the work He has already done to remain.
Lord, each day, help me to get out of your way so that you can continue to do the work you are doing in and through me. All for Your glory.
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Meeting God in the Mundane
Doing the endless dishes, washing the dirty clothes, cleaning the bathroom, picking up the clutter, sweeping the floor for the millionth time…it’s easy to get lost in the mundane. It’s easy for it to quickly become meaningless. To find ourselves bitter that these things steal the majority of our time.
If you’re like me, you want all your moments to count. You don’t want to wish the days away. You want to embrace the time you have. And in that, it requires us to embrace even the mundane. This was the hard part for me.
The me even just 5 years ago was constantly living for the next big thing. Biding my time in the mundane, in the in-between, until I could get to the next big thing. I think that is where the bitterness began.
Because the reality is the majority of life is the mundane. And if we’re trying to constantly get through and past it quickly, it begins to feel like it is holding us back, wasting our time, and keeping us from what we really want. And that is where bitterness grows.
After I willingly stepped away from my teaching career, I quickly realized my life was going to look a lot different. What I found my identity in and poured myself into for 13 years was over and I felt a little lost. I scrambled to find the next big thing to throw myself into. And I did, quite quickly actually. And as quickly as it came, it went. It failed and it felt like I failed. And I was left questioning if I had made the right decision leaving teaching, taking on something new, and wondering if, at the end of it all, I just really wasn’t cut out to do much of anything.
Instead of living for the next big thing and finding it always fell short and left me feeling lost, God was inviting me into meeting Him in the mundane. Gently showing me that He was always there waiting for me to be with Him, to reassure me that my identity was in Him and not in what I did. He began to show me that His purpose and presence was in every moment, even the most mundane.
So this is the journey God has had me on for the last few years…meeting God in the mundane. The day-to-day responsibilities, opportunities, and rhythms. If most of life is the mundane, then God has great purpose and presence in that and I want to experience God in all of that. Moment by moment, day by day.
Here are a few things I’ve learned as I’ve begun to really embrace the time that I am given and meet God in the mundane:
1. Knowing that God is in every moment, even the most mundane, takes these times and tasks from mundane to extraordinary.
Psalm 16:11 says, “You reveal the path of life to me; in Your presence is abundant joy; in Your right hand are eternal pleasures.”
We don’t ever have to ask for the presence of God. He is always with us. But knowing that He is with us even in the most mundane moments makes it pretty amazing. “In Your presence is abundant joy.” You don’t have to love the task to embrace His presence and the joy that comes with that.
2. Even the most mundane tasks serve a purpose: to honor God and to love and serve others.
Mother Teresa once said, “Wash the plate, not because it’s dirty, nor because you’re told to wash it, but because you love the person who’ll use it next.”
We’re not scrubbing the toilets because we love it. We’re scrubbing the toilets because we desire to honor God with what we have and to use it to love and serve others.
3. Rushing past the mundane might be missing out on an opportunity to know God in a way you couldn’t any other way.
If much of life is comprised of the mundane, how much time and opportunity to know God will we be missing if we just try to rush through it to get to the next big thing? What if in those small moments washing dishes the Lord wants to whisper something to our hearts that we would normally be too busy and distracted to hear? God is in the big, but He’s also in the small, normal, mundane moments that make up most of our days. And as we saw in His life lived out on this earth, most of Jesus’s most profound moments with His children were in the everyday tasks and rhythms of life. He wants to meet us there.
I’m convinced as we meet God in the mundane, we will experience Him more deeply which will in turn transform us to look more like Him. When we think about it that way, it seems we’re the ones who are gaining the most when we embrace the mundane to meet with God. 🫶🏼
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Enough
That’s my word for 2024. But I bet it’s not what you’re thinking.
It has NOTHING to do with me.
GOD IS ENOUGH. He is always enough.
Much of my life, I always felt like I was never enough. And so I did everything I could do try and be enough for everyone. And I did everything I could to prove to everyone that what I was able to do was the very best.
I always had to get the best grades.
I always had to be the best daughter.
I always had to be the most loyal friend.
I always had to be the most supportive sister.
And any time someone needed help, I always had to be the one to solve the problem and help take away the negative emotions the other person was feeling.
I always had to make it better for others.
And it was exhausting. In all that striving, I never was able to be enough for anyone.
But this continued for the majority of my life and is still a struggle today if I’m not aware and plugged into the only source that is enough.
The last few years have been characterized by greater and deeper levels of freedom as I have come to know Jesus in even more intimate and transforming ways. I believe that is the only way I could get to 2024 and recognize the truth about being enough.
I thought I would get to a point where I felt like I was finally enough. But that was never the point.
The point was to get to see and embrace that HE HAS ALWAYS BEEN ENOUGH.
I WILL NEVER BE ENOUGH. I don’t have to be enough, because GOD IS ALWAYS ENOUGH.
He’s never too little and never too much.
He’s exactly what I need at all times.
He is always enough. And because of that, I don’t have to be. (Insert BIG sigh of relief) I was never created to be. It’s always been HIM.
That is so freeing!
In His immense goodness, the more I surrender to Him, the more He becomes enough. Enough for me. Enough in me. Enough through me. ENOUGH.
I have a feeling 2024 is going to be a year of letting go of more so that His enough overflows my heart. And in that freedom, I can more fully embrace who He is and who He has created me to be.
My verse for 2024 is 2 Corinthians 9:8. It says…
“And God is able to make every grace overflow to you, so that in every way, always having everything you need, you may excel in every good work.”
In this verse, a form of the Greek word for “all” is used four times (every). A closely related word is translated “always.”
EVERY grace.
In EVERY way.
EVERYthing I need.
For EVERY good work.
If that doesn’t communicate how ENOUGH God is, I don’t know what does.
(I will be unpacking this verse even more in a coming blog post!)
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Identity ≠ Accomplishments
(Previous blog post from April 2, 2023)
More of my life has been spent with the belief that my accomplishments created my identity than the opposite. I lived thinking and believing that when I accomplished goals, promotions, leading roles, then I was really somebody. If people knew who I was, then I felt good about myself. And if I can be transparent, even typing these words makes me cringe. But it is truly where I found my identity, I just couldn’t admit it when I was in the middle of it.
But what I could tell you all those years was that I was exhausted and never felt enough. I never knew enough, did enough, served enough, created enough, was enough. I was always trying to be a step ahead and a step above. And although it manifested as pride (and it was pride), it was my weak attempt at making sure others found me valuable. Because on my own, I didn’t think I was.
And on a much deeper level, all of this striving communicated that God in me was not enough either.
You might be wondering how I stopped evaluating my identity based on these things.
Well, I wish I could tell you I woke up one morning and had a great revelation that changed my heart and mind to stop all the striving. That is so far from the truth.
Let me back up a little bit and fill you in on a bit more of my story.
I was a secondary, special education teacher for 13 years. And I loved it. And I was good at it. But I made sure I was good at it and was recognized for being good at it. It wasn’t enough for me to just know God had given me a gift for teaching. Nope.
I needed others to validate that.
Then about halfway through those 13 years of teaching, I decided I wanted to pursue seminary. I always knew God was calling me to do more than teach within the public school system. And I was confident it involved some aspect of public ministry. After encouragement from those that knew me well, I began and completed my degree in ministerial leadership while also teaching full-time. Those years in seminary were some o my driest years spiritually (a story for another post). I was so focused on knowledge consumption, doing well, and proving myself that any and all opportunities for intimacy with God were wasted.
After seminary I was convinced I would just be handed the ministry position of my dreams. That was not so much the case. And what did finally develop was a volunteer position doing something I hoped to be paid to do. But I took the opportunity to get experience and in all honesty, make my name known.
Friends, I didn’t do well. It wasn’t so much that I couldn’t do well, but rather I was so focused on proving myself that asking for help or admitting I didn’t know something was not an option. Ugly, I know.
So I resigned from that volunteer position feeling more defeated than ever.
I continued teaching, still knowing God was calling me to more or different.
And it wasn’t until the birth of my firstborn that I gained enough courage to step away from teaching to pursue the “more”. A new opportunity almost immediately presented itself and I was overjoyed. It was all the validation I needed.
It went well for a while. Until it didn’t. It was one of the first times I tackled something that truly would be an appropriate challenge using my gifts.
However, I was in an environment where questions and needing additional support and guidance was not appreciated or encouraged.
This failed experience brought all of my insecurities right back to the surface and the striving to be enough kicked into full force. All my fears of being found to be an imposter, unable, and not enough came right to the surface. Even my ability to hear God’s voice and follow His leading was in question.
At this point in my life, I was just a mom.
I didn’t have an external, important job.
I didn’t have any big accomplishments or achievements.
In fact, everything I had wrapped up into my identity was gone.
And the one thing I always said (prior to having kids) I never wanted to be, I was. A stay-at-home-mom.
Fast forward to today, having been a SAHM for the last few years, I can say with certainty that the road leading up to where I am today is the exact method God needed use to strip me of finding my identity and value in my accomplishments. It was painful, hard, and deeply gut-wrenching at times, but if it is the vehicle God used to bring me to the place I am today, I can say with honesty I would do it all again.
It is my greatest joy to be a mama to my two babies. And having all of the worldly accolades, accomplishments, and roles stripped away, I have my identity anchored solidly in the One who gave me life. And even more, when opportunities do arise for other ways to use my gifts, I can step into those knowing I have nothing to prove because I know who I am. And that is unchanging.
Now let me be clear, I am not saying I wake up every day with pure confidence and peace knowing my identity is solidly in Christ. But because I now have the gift of awareness at where I use to find and place my identity, I can more quickly catch myself when I fall back into that trap. Take a step back. Adjust my focus.
Bathe my heart and mind in truth. And reevaluate my next steps to make sure what I am doing and thinking is aligned with who I am, a daughter of the Most High.
I know who I am. I know what gifts and skills God has given me. And I know living out my identity and using my gifts and skills can look a million different ways. But no matter what that looks like or how well I do, my identity and value will always be found in the One who rescued my soul.