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Thursday, April 2, 2009

Week 6 - Finding Your Identity in Christ...



Each class thus far has led to this; finding our identity in Christ. After all, that's really what it's all about. Recovery from an eating disorder must be based on finding your true identity in Christ. An eating disorder can so easily become your identity, so much that you don't know who you are without it. When you learn to put on Christ and take off your old self, you no longer need an eating disorder to be your identity, best friend, hobby, coping mechanism or escape. When your identity is in Christ, your meaning and purpose in life is based on your birthright as a child of God and what Christ did on the cross.

We watched a Nooma video, entitled Name. This video addresses the issue of finding our true identity. Here are some tidbits from the video...
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"We each have this unique path, a calling, a life that God has given us; and Jesus invites us to be our true selves and yet we get sidetracked, we get distracted, we get hung up on how we're different from her or we aren't like him and we end up asking the wrong questions."
Do you have a sense of a unique path in your life?
If so, what is it?
Are there ways in which you get distracted by what others
do, say or think?
"You and I have pasts, families we come from, things we've done, mistakes we've made. Where we've been and what we've done have shaped us into who we are today. So we have to embrace our story, our history. You don't have to be proud of it, but you must claim it because it's yours."
Have you claimed your past?
"We need to be saved from all of the times we haven't been our true selves. All the times we've tried to be someone else. All of the lies we've believed about who God made when God made us. All the times we've asked the wrong questions: What about him? What about her? What about them? We've missed the voice of Jesus saying, 'You, follow me.'"
What would it look like for you to completely trust Jesus when he says,
"You, follow me?"
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We believe lies from the world about who we are. We often believe that our identity is found in having the right appearance, status, recognition, or achievements. But our true identity does not come from things of this world. Our true identity comes from being a child of God. Our sense of worth comes not from self, but from being created in the image of God. We have been chosen by Him..."we are God's possession, chosen and secure in Him" 2 Co. 1:21-22, "we are chosen in Christ to be holy" Eph 1:4, "we are chosen by God to be adopted as his child" Eph 1:5.

Through our adoption in Christ we can...
-Be healed of past hurts
-Accept God's truth and love for us
-Find comfort and peace in God's purposes
-Live empowered to share Christ with others

My prayer for everyone struggling with an eating disorder comes from Romans 12:1-2:
"Give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice - the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. 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."
You can make the choice today to exchange your heart, purposes and dreams for God's. When you give your whole self to Him as an act of worship; your mind, body and soul will be transformed. When you find your identity in Christ, you are no longer the person you used to be. Allow Christ to be your identity so that you can find His good and perfect will for your life.

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