OK, so we are moving to a new house in a few weeks and I should probably be packing more boxes...but instead I've spent the past few hours chillaxing on the sofa with a good book. How completely indulgent! It IS a good book :) I confess, it has been a little hard to get into. I think that maybe I'm a bit of a book snob. There are no frills in this one...no bold text, no italics, no font changes at all, no indentations...no thoughts highlighted in a little box on the page. Nope. Just page after page of plain text. Kinda boring for a reader. Presentation matters, but content matters too and this one is big on content. (Oh dear, upon further inspection I have noticed a few indentations and occasional italics -just not quite enough for my taste...ha...I really had no idea I was such a book snob...my apologies!)
Anyway...I just finished the chapter called "Toward a Proper Self-Image". It was very interesting. The author, Bob George, suggests that we blame a lot of our human issues on "poor self-image" when perhaps what we are really looking at is a total preoccupation with self and a misplaced identity. Often we find our identity in relationships. I'm a mother, I'm an administrative assistant. What happens when relationships change? Whew! Sometimes our identity gets wrapped up in a label we've embraced. Hi, I'm Bobby, I'm ADD. I'm Sue, I'm an addict. Listen to this quote: "When someone accepts a label like one of these, it cements his identity in his own mind, as determined by his behavior. Therefore it is natural to assume that the behavior can never change." This week I was challenged to change. It was really hard. The kind of conversation that leaves you with a lump in your throat and puffy red eyes. I want to believe that I am capable of growth and change. It is way too easy to get stuck in a rut and just resign ourselves to the muck and mire. 2 Cor 5:17 is a familiar scripture "If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone the new has come" The author points out that being made a new creation does not refer to our behaviour, it is a statement of identity. In Christ I am new creation. I am no longer identified by sin. Christ is my identity. I no longer walk in darkness...I am a child of the light! I am no longer ruled by fear, because His perfect love casts out fear. In Him I am completely loved and accepted whether I know it or not. So, what do I know about who I am? What do I say about who I am?
Try saying this.
I'm believing that if I can get this identity thing squared away in my heart and mind that my behavior will naturally fall into line with who I KNOW I am!
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