Who Am I? Pt. 2

“I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb. Before you were born I set you apart and appointed you as my prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah 1:5

A lot of people think they know who you are, and they are not shy about telling you who you are. Your friends, your parents, TV, they all think they know who you are. But who do you believe? Who do you trust? Some people know a small, shallow facet of you. People want to define us based on a lot of things, based upon your appearance, age, skills, clothes, where you are from. It is easy to start living up to those expectations. When people say that you won’t ever end up amounting to anything, it is easy to stop trying to succeed. Everybody wants to tell you who you are, and the truth is, we all want to know who we are. We want to know what group we fit in, and what defines us.
Jeremiah 29:11 “I know the plans I have for you says the Lord, they are plans for good, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

If you want to know the purpose of something, you need to go to the maker of that product. You don’t go to one of the people that uses it, no matter how well they know it; you go straight to the maker. So often we talk to other creation to find out who we are, when really we need to go ask the creator for that information. God created them as well, and they don’t know any more than you do. The problem is that the world is screaming at us from every aspect of our lives, and it’s so easy to get trapped in that. Sometimes it’s even a good message, but it’s incomplete. The world is just as confused as you are about what it is, and what others are supposed to be. No one has it figured out, everyone is just trying to figure out what works.

When you make something, you make it for a purpose. When God created you, he created you with a purpose. The way that you are, are the way that God created you, to fulfill a specific destiny. He has given you all the capabilities, and talents that you need to fit the role that God has given you. It’s easy to classify people by their appearance, and that they are supposed to look a certain way, but we all.

To find out who you really are, you have to quiet the sound of the world around you.

Romans 12:2 “Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.

Don’t let the TV you listen to, the music you listen to, the friends you have in school make you the person that you are. Let God be the one that shapes who you are, he wants to show you your true purpose. God wants to free you from the labels that society has put into place, and he wants to free you from the judgments that have been passed upon you. The pattern of this world is counterfeit.. People put labels on you, but they aren’t real, and there are no real purpose behind them. Even if it’s real, it is a shallow reality.

If you let God transform your life, and let him show you what his will is for you. You will live a fulfilling life, and you will be able to discover his perfect purpose. This doesn’t mean that your life will be without trials, God doesn’t promise that life will be easy for you. He promises that he has plans to prosper you. You don’t have to be someone else to do what God wants you to do. The purpose of something determines its nature, its features. They are built to do what they are meant to do. God built you with a purpose, and the thing that you are called to do is the thing that you will be happiest doing. God made you into a perfect match for your purpose.

Who Am I? Pt. 1

Jeremiah 1:5
“I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb. Before you were born I set you apart and appointed you as my prophet to the nations.”

You are somebody! For some people that is a pretty revolutionary statement. You were not an accident, whether your parents wanted to have you, or planned on having, you were not an accident. You were created to be one thing, God did not create you to be anything, and he created you to be something. He didn’t create you to be anybody that you wanted to be, he created you for one reason, and he had a purpose for why he created you. You were not created to do whatever you set your mind to; you were created to be a certain someone.
Acts 19:13
“A group of Jews was traveling from town to town casting out evil spirits. They tried to use their name of the Lord Jesus in their incantations, saying, “I command you in the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, to come out! Seven sons of Sceva a leading priest were doing this. But one tie when they tried it, the evil spirit replied, “I know Jesus, and I know Paul, but who are you? Then the evil spirit leaped upon them, overpowered them, and attacked them with such violence that they fled from the house naked and battered.”
They were trying to use the name of someone else to cast out demons, because they were unsure of who they of themselves. And the end result of pretending to be someone they weren’t was pain and suffering. When people know who they and they are who they are meant to be. They are exciting to be around. People like Steve Jobs, and Mother Theresa knew who they are, and because of that people wanted to be around them. We sometimes see people that look successful, and we think that we can be successful if we just follow the same course that they followed. We confuse who they are with who we are supposed to be. We chase who someone else is, rather than finding who we are supposed to be. This will never lead to long term success. You can learn principals, character, integrity from other people, but you can’t successfully be who someone else is. It can lead to short term success, these priests, were able to cast out demons for a short period of time, but in the end, they met up with an evil spirit that was bold enough to speak back against them. Eventually you will get to a place in life, where trying to be someone else is going to fail, and only being who you were meant to be will make you succeed.
We live in a society where no one knows what they are supposed to be. There is so much confusion, with us all told to be something that we aren’t meant to be. We open ourselves up to abuse trying to be something that we aren’t meant to be.

Romans 8: 31-38

“What than shall we say in response to these things, if God is for us who can be against us?”

See when you know who you are in Christ, you won’t be moved by accusations. You won’t be affected by labels, and you will be firm in your stand, knowing that you are justified, and a conqueror that you are not a loser. When you don’t know who you are, you bounce around trying all sorts of different things, your life becomes scattered. But when you know who you are, your life will be focused like a laser beam, and you will have power.