Check The Label (2)

What happens when some of our usual identification points are marred by events which were totally out of our control or by choices we have made?  One or both of our parents may have abandoned us. Our family of origin might have been dysfunctional and we were left with unmet needs. We have painful memories from the schools we attended or the churches or organizations we belonged to. Our friends may have let us down or encouraged us along a path of destructive lifestyle.  We may have had a detrimental effect on someone else’s life.  We may have abandoned our spouse or they may have left us.   Our children may have suffered from our wrong choices or they may be causing us pain from their choices.  How do we identify ourselves when one or more of these events has been present in our lives?  Do we hide in our addictions because the person we are inside our heads is wrapped up in the painful way these events impacted us? 

God is not surprised by anything that has taken place in our lives and God cares.  King David wrote in Psalm 139:13-16, “For you created my inmost being you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body.  All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” 

God knows all about each day of our lives.  We can bring into His light all those things we are keeping in darkness because even darkness is as light to Him.  When we accept the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as payment for all the sins committed against us and by us we become new creations.  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! (2 Corinthians 5:17 NIV) 

We have a wonderful choice before us.  Do we want to live today under our old identity of rejection, pain and shame, OR in our new identity given by Jesus where we are forgiven, healed, loved and accepted by God?  Will we continue to hold on to the old ways of dealing with life as the wreck we believe we are, even though the old is gone, or are we willing to choose to follow God’s good ways as we express the new creation that we truly are in Christ?

©2013 Partners in Hope