John 1:12-13 NKJV – “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.“
As I’ve grown, I’ve understood that everyone falls into categories. No matter where you are, how strange and unique you think you are, your endless list of struggles, your endless list of blessings, there are people in the world who are at least 5% similar to you. Whether you realize it or not, you are living a shared experience with someone else. For instance, I am a Christian. I belong to a certain age group, I am West African, I am female, I am an employee, a daughter, etc. I am an endless list of things. Each of the categories I just mentioned? At least one of the 7 billion people on this planet fit into one or more. Your circumstance and the categories you fall into are unlikely to be completely unique: After all, “there is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).
Of course, drawing the line is not easy, even more so in the face of adversity. Here’s a tip: the more you know the Creator, the closer you can get to and be to who He created you to be, and the more you can define yourself by Him. The age-old attack of the enemy has never been about how good you are at withstanding temptation but rather on identity. The best way to find yourself and to define yourself is to find and know who made you. Anything contrary to His instruction has no place where you are and no business shaping your identity. And your thought might be that God has bigger fish to fry than little old you, but the Lord is love, and the Lord is big enough to care and address the smallest of things, and you are no small thing. He is who we belong to and who formed our inward parts, so He knows you best (Psalm 139:13). Colossians 3:3 reminds us that our life is “hidden with Christ in God,” which means our true self is found when we align our hearts with His purpose and truth.
You can be anything you want to be in a world full of endless differences. But before you were anything at all, you were first God’s creation. Let everything else flow from that and that alone. Our home is not here. We are passing through. And as we are here on this Earth, I pray in Jesus’ name that we never forget where God is supposed to be on the list – first. I pray that we are able to give honour to whom honour is due, and live as we should, even where we identify.
