My heart breaks for the current state of the world when it comes to true identity. Among the 6 billion humans of the earth many have forgotten or never found out that they are a child of God and that they have this amazing heavenly father who only wants them to live a life to the fullest potential (John Chapter 10 verse 10).
He says in his word that at the beginning he made us in His image and His likeness (Genesis Chapter 1 verse 27) and that as His very breath (Ruach) came into our lungs and we became human.
So in recent times as I live, travel and see the headlines of current issues I am saddened that we in our world have such an identity crisis on our hands. So many of his children are on a search for identity, but the problem is that it is devoid of their creator and therefore the blueprint and very origins on their making.
It might be a simple way of looking at life, but the very foundations of our identity is being made in His image and His likeness. This is a call from the very beginning to not be identified by what we do, but actually who we are.
His image and His likeness
To be made in his image and likeness literally means that we take on the very characteristics of God. And with these characteristics we are able to represent them on the earth.
One of God’s original plans was that as we execute his characteristics we can look after the amazing gift that our world is. A call to tend and to have dominion and to be fruitful has been mixed up into a pursuit of things, money and pursuing a higher status in society based on these temporary things. Where did we lose the plot? The short answer is that we have forgotten that we are Children of God.
The fruit of His character
Along with this current thought I have been meditating on the characteristics of God and I could go no further than looking at the fruit of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was there at the beginning of creation with the Father; he was the power behind Jesus’ ministry and is the fuel for our continued mission to carry his Kingdom in our current day. We read about this fruit in the book of Galatians in Chapter 5 verse 22:
“But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control.”
So to be made in his image and likeness and to find our true identity as children of God means that our lives should overflow with these characteristics. When I look at that list of qualities I can’t help but to draw a conclusion that we as the human race we are not drawing identities from this source.
When we forget our character
What I see in the world and the Church is a lack of these qualities and therefore the fruit of our world has gone a little astray from the original plan of the representation of God’s character. Unfortunately because we have been confused about what identity really is and its source, there has been a mass confusion that has spread over the earth.
Currently I see a world that does not draw identity from these characteristics in themselves, but rather from what they do. We have become human-doings, rather than human-beings.
This therefore means that we define ourselves by such temporary things and we spend our lives chasing them to discover that we are still unfulfilled. Our world has become defined and looks for identity in things like sexuality, fashion, celebrities, peer groups, subcultures, lobby groups, extremism, politics, religion and more.
The problem with this is that these things are always changing and we really don’t know if they will be the same tomorrow. It seems that popularity and following is more important than true identity. Just look at the absolute obsession with social media and pursuit of ‘likes’ and ‘followers’ that has become our world.
The really sad thing is that as the human race story continues there is fierce rivalry against giving any credit to our creator. We seem to want to leave out the very God who knows who we are and the one that gifted us with what makes up our identity (Psalm 139). We instead run from this source trying to work out our identities ourselves. It is like we have a 3000 piece IKEA unit and we don’t want to consult the instructions and therefore the instructor.
I am a child of God
I can only speak for myself, but it seems ludicrous that many of God’s children seem to do life this way. When I came to understand my God as an amazing father who just wants to be part of my life and wants me to display His characteristics I realised that it is so much better doing life with Him than without.
I also came to understand that when I go to the source of my identity there is a direct impact into my life and the daily workings of it. I have found that the only time that things in life go really pear shaped is when I forget that my identity is a Child of God that is made in His image and His likeness.
Justin Monaghan is currently launching as a professional prophetic artist under the label JR Faith Creations. He is married to Liana and lives at the beautiful beach of Port Willunga. Justin is also heavily involved in his local surfing community of South Australia as a surf coach, a judge of surf contests and a member of Christian Surfers
Justin Monaghan’s previous articles may be viewed at http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/justin-monaghan.html