Just because your family is not meeting for worship at TCC on Sunday Dec. 28th*, we want to encourage your family to meet with God. Click Here for an 8-minute video message from Pastor Kevin Deming on “Identity: What Define’s You?” We know that everybody is defined by something, the question is, “Is your life defined by the right things?”
*Triangle Community Church values and appreciates our volunteers and during the week after Christmas we don’t hold services at TCC in order to give time for our volunteers to be with their families, travel and have a break. We will resume normal services on Sunday, Jan. 4, 2015.
There are so many things in our lives that we let define who we are. In Fact, Every single one of us is defined by something. Sometimes in life we are defined by what we want to define us and other times things in life define us for us.
Some examples where we let things define us are: the people we associate with, how many friends we have on facebook or followers on twitter, what our job is, where we live, what kind of car we drive, how much money we make, our view of politics, a sports team, and even what church we go to.
The question is, should we let these things be what we define our lives by?
What if we are letting the wrong things define us?
When I was in Kenya, I found it very interesting and encouraging that every single Christian I met, introduced themselves when they stood in front of a group by saying, “Hi, my name is…Kevin… and I am born again. The would then go on to say what college they went to, or what they do for a living. But the first thing that every Christian Keyan wanted you to know is that they identified with Christ. What made them special and important wasn’t what they did but that they belonged to Jesus.
So, what does the bible say about what happens to our life when we belong to Jesus!
Galatians 2:20, “20 I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”
My life now, belongs to Christ. Think about it. I am no longer the one living but Christ in me. What Defines me needs to be that I belong to Christ and that all of my desires, dreams, goals, purpose and meaning belong to Christ. At first when you hear this it might sound, well, hard to hear. Of course this is because we love to be in control. The thing we don’t realize that if we do not belong to Christ, we are not free to live however, we want, instead we belong to sin.
Jesus said in John 8:34 Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB)
34 Jesus responded, “I assure you: Everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.
Paul expands on this in Romans 6:17- 18, 17 But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
So we either are slaves to sin or slaves to righteousness. I want the fact that I have Christ in me to define me, not my sin defining me. I want my life to first be noticed for what God is doing in and through me rather than what my job is or what group I belong to. I want when I die for people to remember my God more than they remember me. That is what it means to leave a legacy, that is what it means to live your life defined by Christ.
What do you believe would change about how we live, think or feel if we put our value and worth on belonging to Christ?
What determines your worth? – What someone would pay for something.
What did God pay for you? He gave his son Jesus.
There is no greater value that can be put on something than the creator of the universe giving His son Jesus Christ to be our substitute for our sin. There isn’t one thing that holds more value or worth than this. So when you are thinking about what you want to define you, there is nothing I could put as more important to define me than my life being associated with Jesus.
Application Challenge
- Start digging into God’s word and seeing how God sees us and defines us. Just type in Google, “Who I am in Christ” and begin to see what the Bible says about how you should be defined.
- Daily read out loud the Who I am in Christ Guide. The guide is listed below.
It is important for us to see ourselves as identified with Christ and belonging to Him.
Hi, my name is Kevin and I Born Again!