Who Am I? / Foundations

``Your circumstances, they might explain part of your story, but it doesn't determine where you go from here. In Christ, your identity no matter what it is in this world is restored through placing your faith in his name. And through your identity found in Christ, your purpose is revealed. In this life, love God and love others just as Jesus did. [00:21:40] (38 seconds)  #IdentityInChrist

But what happens to these people is they encounter Jesus. Jesus doesn't care about the box. No. Jesus touches the unclean leper. Jesus speaks to the woman. He heals her just by his power for her coming up to him. Jesus goes and he he pursues Zacchaeus. He heals and he touches the people that nobody else could touch. [00:06:05] (41 seconds)  #JesusReachesAll

Is it is it the man's fault or is it his parents fault that he was born blind? Jesus said it's not either. But the things that we experience here in this world are are experienced so that God can be glorified by all that we do. It's not his blindness that defines him, it's whether or not he chooses to follow Jesus. [00:08:58] (24 seconds)  #GodsGloryInSuffering

A true identity is found in Jesus. To rip apart the box, to to remove ourselves from the the boxes that we place ourselves into in this world. To realize that Jesus came and he died for your sins because you are a chosen people. You are royalty in his name. You are holy not because of the things that we've done but because of the things he did. We are children of the one true God. [00:15:18] (40 seconds)  #ChosenAndRoyal

But what we saw from what Jesus did, what we experienced at the table is that as as confining as this box can be. It's also very easy at times to simply rip it open and remove yourself from the box. As we shift what our identity is, from the things of this world, from being placed in the boxes whether it's your your friends group or whether it's the the things that you like, whether it's the failures that you've experienced and shift our identity to being a child of God. [00:11:27] (52 seconds)  #BreakFreeFromLabels

Set your light on the light stand. Don't trap it under a blanket. Be the love that Christ offered to the world. Show that to the world. Reach out to God and ask of him, remove the identities that I have of this world. [00:20:46] (23 seconds)  #LetYourLightShine

By our nature, people as what I see online at least want to be right. They want to they want to put a little jab in there. They want to see somebody to ask a question a different way than they would and and to jump on them for it. Jesus says, go touch those untouchable people. Go be his light into the world. Set your basket on the hill. [00:20:06] (40 seconds)  #ReachTheUntouchable

We can't recreate these moments but we can glean from them how Jesus responds to people. All too often even in the church, we put people into boxes of addiction, of failure, of divorce, insecurities or being outcast. We don't feel like we're enough or that we're too broken for Jesus. Sometimes we reduce the complexities of life into boxes. [00:10:34] (52 seconds)  #PeopleNotLabels