Friday, January 04, 2013

Identity in Christ Brings Growth in Christ

I decided to let a new year allow me to revisit my old blog.  With that said, I was going through old posts that I had begun years ago but never actually posted.  Here is one of those:
All of us tend to resist change. There is a built-in drive toward stability known as equilibrium. This God-created characteristic is necessary to avoid becoming overwhelmed with ideas....  Yet it is this same resistance to change, in addition to our flesh, that sometimes makes it difficult for us to grow in Christ. Part of the process of developing to spiritual maturity is overcoming the inertia that prevents us from becoming increasingly ‘conformed to the image of His Son’ (Romans 8:29). Foundations of Ministry p. 75
I have found the essence of the thinking in this quote to be very true of how I have thought. My resistance to change, compounded with my flesh, has made it difficult for me to grow in Christ.  Knowing that and knowing that my ultimate goal as a Christian is to become more and more like Jesus and bring glory to God, why do I resist change that will make me more like Him?

I’m convinced that the more I understand that I am identified with Christ, the more I will allow myself to be changed to His likeness.  In other words, with my focus on Jesus, remembering that I am a child of the living God, I know that I can change and I want to change.  When I focus on the change, itself, and all that I have to DO to be Christ-like, I get frustrated and quickly feel like I’m faced with a totally insurmountable task.  What makes me feel that way?  Well, I feel that way because the task IS insurmountable; I, myself, cannot become like Christ through any effort of my own!  (If I could complete the change myself through hard work and maybe a little luck, then I wouldn’t need Jesus!  On my own, I would have attained the acceptance of God...and since I know myself all too well, I know that's just not possible.)  I need Jesus to continue to draw me to Himself so that I can become more and more transformed to His likeness.  And the more I remind myself that I am a child of God and identified with Christ, the more I want to live up to the loftiness of those truths...for His glory.

When I first read the above quote from the text, all of these thoughts and feelings jumped out at me.  It’s true: there are so many times when we, as Christians, feel like we cannot fight the undertow that is pulling us away from Christ.  However, I have found that the more I identify myself with Christ, the more I find that the undertow is not as strong as I thought.  In my journey to know and to experience God and His love, I have come to better comprehend the reality of my identity in Christ.  I recognize that the inertia in my own life does not have to signal that I’m farther away from Christ; it can actually be taking me back to Him—reminding me that I need Him and that it is only through Jesus, that I have hope in this life.  I know that I’m far from having worked out all of my “issues”.  However, I’ve found that my identity in Christ brings me to live life as a more committed and joyful Christian—one that is becoming more like Him with each new day.  What do you think?