8/7/2019 MMW Identity It is a Life Choice

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Identity It Is A Life Choice

The old philosophers had a saying, I think therefore I am. A more current versioncould well be this I am this therefore I am. We now define ourselves by the thingsthat define us, the things that rock our boat

Part of the Generation X description is that this group, who are now 30 40 years old,

tend to find their identity in the things that have most meaning to them. They maywork at a particular occupation but their identity is more related to the parts of their lifethat mean the most to them.

The parents to Gen Xers as a general rule found their identity in what they did for aliving. I am not sure which came first the income or the occupation but somehow thelink seemed to be there between the two. This was so clear cut that at the start of thepush for equality in the workplace the phrase oh Im just a housewife was almost ahanging offence. The promoters of the equality case kept coming up with other quasieconomic definitions like Domestic Affairs Manager.

I am not entirely sure if the Gen Xers might not have come up with the better deal.Especially is this so for Christ Followers.

We have a new life that is to be found in the words and example of our Master Jesus.He enables that new life, we must choose it but the decision is just the start, from thatpoint onward the old man must be fought against. You see we become two separatedisjointed identities, the old which takes its identity from where we came from andthe new which is our identity in Jesus where we need to take on Jesus as ourinspiration and meaning.

This is not to disparage our physical lives. We are physical as well as spiritual . Whatwe do as physical beings has merit and meaning, the old is not all bad. We have a lifeas provider or employee aside from our spiritual being and we have a past which isnot invalidated by our New Life . It may be true that some may have to work harderthan others to overcome their old life, take Paul of Tarsus for example.

The Devil would have the old man pull us back into the old ways. The Devil knowsjust how effective a life committed and sold-out to Jesus is. We need to be so centredon the Master that He can lift us over those times that the old life becomes moreattractive than the trials of today.

We did not sign on to this Faith life because it was peaches and cream . It will be attimes but as sure as sure there are days in every believers life where it appears to beeasier to throw in the towel.

As I said just before Paul of Tarsus was one who had to struggle with his earlier lifebefore Christ. If anyone had a brick wall to climb over it was this man who ordered thestoning of Steven. This is how he described himself in the letter to the Church at

PhilippiYou know my pedigree: a legitimate birth, circumcised on the eighth day; an Israelite from the elite tribe of

Benjamin; a strict and devout adherent to God's law; a fiery defender of the purity of my religion, even to

the point of persecuting the church; a meticulous observer of everything set down in God's law Book.

Philippians 3:5-7

The mystery of the story of Paul is that he was accepted as a member of theCommunity of Faith by those smarting from the Pharisees Crucifixion of Christ andthe stoning of Steven that he ordered.

The good news is that we dont have to get over that history : thank you God.