About ID

^{by Simon Elliott – Everyday Church, London}

The foundation of Identity

The first foundation we must examine is the one of Identity. Our identity matters. Identity works on a number of levels. At times we have to prove our identity in order to allow us to borrow money, pass through customs, get on a plane.
In these cases, we are simply persuading someone that we have certain rights of passage or trustworthiness. It’s the identity that can be stolen from us by scam artists, etc. Obviously, serious though identity theft might be, what we are talking about here is something deeper.
Andrew Bunt in his excellent book “Finding Your Best Identity” defines identity like this:

“Identity is our controlling self-understanding. All of us live with a concept of who we really are and what we believe to be most fundamental and important about us. This is a self-understanding. It’s how we understand our self…. Something that is true of us only becomes our identity when it becomes core to how we view ourselves and when it therefore begins to exert some control over us, affecting how we feel and how we live. Identity is our controlling self-understanding.”
^{Andrew Bunt}

Our core identity is best summed up by how we would complete the following sentence:
I am a ……
We instantly recognise that we could complete this sentence in numerous ways:

I am a son
I am a Dad
I am a husband
I am a leader
I am employed
I am a friend
I am white
I am British
I am insecure
I am partially deaf
I am a Westham United fan!

All of these things are true about me and all of them could form my identity. But to borrow Andrew’s phrase, the things that carry most weight in forming my identity are those which:

“become core to how we view ourselves and when it therefore begins to exert some control over us, affecting how we feel and how we live. Identity is our controlling self-understanding.”
^{Andrew Bunt}

Our identity is not something we are born with; it is something that is formed in us as we grow. In our world today, there are two foundational ways that identity is formed in us – external formation and internal formation. This is clearly an over-simplification of a complex process – but it helps us begin to understand identity.
External identity is where our understanding of ourselves is primarily formed by learning to fit within a certain culture. We develop a world view and a safe space within our world by adhering to certain cultural norms and holding certain cultural beliefs – good and bad.
Internal identity is where our understanding of ourselves is based on how we feel and think personally. We define ourselves from within, sometimes rebelling against the prevailing culture.
To make it even more succinct, and again to borrow from Andrew Bunt

External Identity – others decide
Internal Identity – I decide

But, as Christians, as followers of Jesus, we have a third option – GOD decides! Listen to these verses of scripture:

Matthew 17:5
While he was still speaking, a bright cloud covered them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!”
John 15:15
I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.
1 John 3:1
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.
Galatians 3:26-29
So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Romans 8:1
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death

The Scripture is clear. My identity is not in my relational status, my sexuality, my gender, my profession, my ministry or my position in society. My identity is in God.
To borrow from the worship song by Charity Gayle:

“I am who I am
because the I AM tells me
who I am”
^{Charity Gayle}

An identity based on my culture will always be flawed because every culture has been infected by the power and brokenness of sin.
An identity based on my internal dialogue and emotion will always be flawed because I am flawed – loved by God but flawed – if I base my identity on my emotion and my thoughts, it will change with the tide.
But an identity based on what God says about me is eternal!
What is more, whereas internal and external identities have to be defended – and if I want to know where I am placing my identity, I just need to look at where I get defensive.
My identity in God is defined and defended by God himself – I just need to choose to live in the good of that identity.
…

HU