WHO AM I?

Who am I?

What is my purpose?

Why am I here?

Who am I supposed to be?

What am I supposed to do?

Am I doing all that I should?

Am I being the person I am meant to be?

For as long as I can remember I have asked myself these questions over and over, in various ways. I have often felt lost, or not understood my purpose. I feel like I am constantly trying to figure that out, especially since I became a mom. I know the obvious answers, that as a Christian I am supposed to:

• Lead by example.
• Love everyone.
• Show God’s love to everyone.
• Raise my children to love (and fear) God.
• Thrive to be as Christ-like as I can in this world (always ask “What would Jesus do?”).

But I still often feel lost.

We all know the verse “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart…” (Jeremiah 1:5). This is a comforting verse. It means that God planned us, each and every one of us. God had a plan for each of us, our very own plan. It’s an amazing, comforting, overwhelming, and scary thought.

Well, this Sunday, at our wonderful new church Crossroads Fellowship, Pastor Chuck Milian opened my eyes, as he frequently does, to something incredible! He quoted verses and explained something further. If you can, I suggest going to the website and listening to the sermon from this past Sunday. If you can’t listen to the whole thing go to the last ¼ of the sermon. If I could figure it out I would link to just that portion of the sermon and put it up here, but I can’t so you will have to do a little leg work… But it’s worth it. Go there now! (Pick the sermon "Fault Lines: 7 Dimensions of Disaster  Week 3: Degenerations") 

What I can do is paraphrase what he said, in how it touched me, and share that with you. But really, go listen to the sermon…

Background verses:

¹⁷ Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it. (Revelation 2:17 NIV)

¹⁰ For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:10 NIV)

3 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. ² Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears,^[a] we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. (1 John 3:1-2 NIV)

²³ Search me, God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my anxious thoughts.
²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me,
    and lead me in the way everlasting. (Psalm 139:23-24 NIV)

What does this mean? Well, in the Revelations verse, the white stone has our name written on it. The background history is that back in the day, there were two reasons someone would receive a white stone. The first was in court, when a judge would deem someone free to go and that they weren’t guilty they would receive a white stone from him to prove his innocence. By God giving us a white stone it is His way of telling us our sins are forgiven, that we are not guilty, and are free. The second reason you would receive a white stone in biblical days was when a rich man would invite you to a feast. It was an invitation. By us receiving a white stone with our name on it means that Jesus has also given us a ticket to enter into the feast in the Kingdom of God. Pretty great, right?

But what does this also mean? That name that is written on the stone is the name that God gave to us. It is known only to the one who reads it. It is the name that God named us in the womb, before we were in the womb in fact, and it is the person He created us to be! WOW! And when we die, and are at the gates of heaven, and receive this stone that is meant only for us, we will each and every one of us learn our true name! And at that very moment we will KNOW who we are! We will know our purpose. We will know why we were in existence. We will know what our true accomplishments on this earth were and what they meant to God. We will know, without a doubt, our purpose and our identity as defined by God!

WOW! How profound this message was. So WHO AM I? I ask? Well, for all my struggling to try and figure out who I am, God has known all along. God has my purpose. God knows me. God defines me! Someday I will know the answer, but right now all I need to know is that God knows.

I don’t know how I can carry this with me from now on but I am going to try. When I feel lost, I am going to imagine my white stone, with my true name on it as God wrote it, waiting for me, because God loves me.

I emplore you to go on and view the sermon. It’s eye opening to say the least. I don't do it justice.