Who Am I

“And as he was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in the form of a dove. And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my Son, whom I love, with you I am well pleased.’”  Luke 3:21-22

If you want to get on an airplane, you must present some official form of identification – a valid driver’s license or a passport. You can’t drive a car or cash a check or sign up for a class at school without legal documentation of your identity. And how many passwords does it take to prove that you are the official user of your computer or phone?  Everyone, it seems, wants to know if we are really who we claim to be.  So, shouldn’t it be easy to explain who we are? I might begin by describing myself physically or telling you what I do for a living or what my hobbies are. In other words, I am what I do. Or I might tell you about my family or how healthy I am or what I own or what abilities I possess. I might even base my identity on what other people say about me – my reputation in the community. The problem is that all those things can change in an instant. Someone who had suffered an unexpected job loss once said to me, “I don’t know who I am now.” Our worldly circumstances change constantly – health, employment, friends and family and even reputation may all fail or disappoint, and if those are the basis of who we think we are, we can find ourselves feeling lost and unsure and even depressed. Jesus’s great temptation in the wilderness was to believe that he was someone else – someone who needed to prove himself by turning stone into bread or jumping from the temple; someone who could make others bow to his power. But Jesus had heard the Divine affirmation and he says, “No, no, no. I am the Beloved Son of God.” Jesus is sometimes praised, and sometimes despised and rejected, but he never loses sight of his identity as the Beloved of God.  Throughout his earthly ministry, that was his core truth and as his heirs, it is our truth also. In a world filled with loud voices that try to make us feel unworthy and unlovable, God’s voice whispers, “You are my Beloved son or daughter, on you my favor rests. I have called you by name from the very beginning. You belong to me and nothing will ever separate us.” You will still need your legal ID to board a plane, but you will never have to doubt who you are and Whose you are.

Prayer: Jesus, You are the Beloved and because of your saving grace, I and all your people are the Beloved. How sweet it is to rest confidently in that truth. Amen.

Francie Winslow