Beloved
Certainty through identity
Written by Anja Scholl, CBN Editorial Team
It has never been as difficult to find your own identity as it is today. In the past, identity-forming things such as education, career and sometimes even choice of partner were dictated by parents. Today, we have more freedom.
Children discover their own identity by slipping into different roles: they play family, hunt down criminals as superheroes, are athletes, artists, top chefs, writers, aristocrats, gardeners, drive excavators or trains. They test and discover their bodies, humor, feelings, values and relationships. They put themselves in all kinds of identities to find the one in which they feel comfortable, in which they resonate and realize: Yes, that’s me.
The self-determination that is so highly valued in our Western civilization means that the huge number of possibilities can sometimes make the choice an agony. We ask ourselves which of the seemingly endless number of possible identities is really me?
The Bible teaches that – opposite to what many believe – man is not inherently good. On the contrary. The writer C. S. Lewis put it this way: “In each of us there is something growing up which will of itself be Hell unless it is nipped in the bud.” The Bible describes man as “evil from childhood” (Genesis 8:21). So, if we only ever follow our thoughts and desires, it will not lead us in the right direction. Anyone who is really allowed to decide everything freely therefore needs something to guide him or her.
Christians find this orientation in the Bible. Reading the living Word of God corrects us, guides us, makes us wise and shows us more and more who God is. But it also shows us that we have already been given an identity by our Creator.
The theologian Henri Nouwen observed: “To be the beloved is the central truth of our existence.” We were created to be loved by God. Our identity – whether Christian or non-Christian – is beloved. This identity is completely independent of us – whether we feel out of place, overlooked, wrong or really good. This identity is permanent.
Sin led to a break between God’s love and our perception of it. Nothing has changed in God’s love for us. However, we no longer live in our intended identity because our relationship with God has been destroyed. A part of us is missing. But through Jesus’ death and resurrection, God created a way that enables us to live in relationship with him and to enter into the identity of beloved.
This identity gives us security. If I understand more and more what it means to be beloved, if I find myself more and more in this identity and live in it, I do not fall into self-doubt at every criticism, my self-worth is not dependent on external circumstances, I can deal with lack because God fulfills my longings. This certainty, this identity gives me peace, which defies uncertain times.
