Who I Am in Christ: Discovering the Part of You That Can Never Change
For the past two weeks, I’ve been offering glimpses into my new book, Lean Into Grace. Today will be our last excerpt from the book. This reading shares the story of one of the most challenging stretches of my life and describes the way God used difficult circumstances to teach me who I am in Christ.
Let’s head into the book together.
Who I Am in Christ
My journey to more deeply understand who I am in Christ began shortly after my 29th birthday when my husband and I discovered that we were expecting our first child.
We were thrilled. We’d been dreaming of becoming parents for four years, and the reality of our news felt almost too good to be true.
Two weeks after discovering our life-changing news, I met my friend Kathy for coffee after work on a sunny spring afternoon. After just one sip of coffee, my stomach turned. A dizzying cloud of nausea descended upon me, and I assumed I was coming down with a stomach bug.
I apologized to Kathy for leaving early and headed home to spend the evening hunched over the toilet. I had no way of knowing that I was about to endure 36 months spent hunched over the toilet.
A few days after the sickness began, I realized I was dealing with hormone-induced pregnancy sickness and not a virus. Sadly, the severe sickness lasted until the end of the pregnancy. Because of the illness, I was forced to take a medical leave of absence from my teaching job and spend my days lying down while trying to stay hydrated.
The physical suffering was horrible. On the worst days, I spent hours lying on the bathroom floor while my stomach refused to settle. Meanwhile, almost as difficult as the physical suffering was stepping back from so many parts of my life that were deeply embedded into my identity.
Who I Am in Christ When Life Is Turned Upside Down
I was unable to teach my students or minister to the teens within our church’s youth group.
I had to step back from women’s ministry, leading Bible studies, and writing.
Throughout the worst months, I was too sick to even receive visits from friends, hold conversations with my husband, or read my Bible.
Every label I had used to define myself was stripped away.
I couldn’t make sense of the trial when I was in the middle of it; however, months after our beautiful baby girl came into the world, God showed me his purpose for my suffering.
He showed me the way he stripped away every part of my identity, and his purpose was to uncover the only part of my identity that can never be taken away.
He showed me that the only part of me that can never change is this: I am unconditionally loved by God. I am his beloved daughter. He fought for me, bled for me, and died for me, and his love can never be taken away from me.
No matter what happens in life—even if lose everything that is valuable to me—I will still be God’s beloved daughter.
God’s Love Will Never Leave You
Friend, if you are a believer, this truth applies to you as well. The only part of you that can never change is your belovedness in God’s eyes.
You are his precious child. He loves you so much that he demonstrated this love by sending his precious Son to die on the cross and receive the punishment you deserve. Your belovedness is the truest thing about you, and it is the only part of your identity that can never change.
Like me, you might find your identity by your job title, the roles you play within relationships, your hobbies, your leadership positions, or even your ability to read your Bible and practice traditional spiritual disciplines.
I hope you never have to endure a season in which these gifts are taken away. However, if you do, your heavenly Father wants you to know that one part of you can never be stripped away: You are his precious and beloved child.
Grasping the Depth of Who I Am in Christ
I surrendered my life to Jesus as a teenager, but it took decades for the truth about my identity to settle into my heart and transform my life. I intellectually knew Jesus loved me, but I couldn’t comprehend what it might look like to live from the firm foundation of this identity.
Many followers of Christ haven’t grasped the truth about their unchanging identities as Christ’s beloved children because they feel unlovable.
On an intellectual level, they know Jesus loves them. However, when they step back to look at their lives, they see a lot of messes. They see habitual sin patterns and areas in which they’re sure they’re disappointing God. They know God loves them, but they find it hard to believe he enjoys them.
I know all about this struggle because, for years, I was certain God was disappointed with me.
Drawing near to him didn’t feel like a life-giving invitation because I imagined he was mad at me.
I imagined he was mad at me for not reading my Bible enough, losing my patience, eating my feelings, snapping at my husband, and falling asleep instead of praying.
Who I Am in Christ According to the Bible
During the years when I was wrestling with these thoughts, I discovered a passage of Scripture that radically transformed my understanding of God’s unconditional love for me. God used the book of Hosea to forever change my perception of his love.
Hosea was a prophet during a time when God’s people had turned away from him.
They were participating in idol worship and had directly rebelled against God.
God sent Hosea to warn the people that he was about to discipline them by sending trouble and hardship upon the land.
However, after warning them about this painful discipline, God offered the most surprising gift: a promise to allure his people in the same way a husband allures his bride. Hosea 2:14 reads, “Therefore, behold, I am going to persuade her, bring her into the wilderness, and speak kindly to her.”
Some of us imagine God turning away from us in disgust when we wander away from him; however, this is not the image offered within Scripture.
When we wander away from God, he looks for ways to draw us into his loving arms.
The New Living Translation of Hosea 2:14 reads, “But then I will win her back once again.”
Like a husband who pursues and lovingly forgives the wife who betrayed him, when we turn away from God and intentionally pursue sin, God pursues us and looks for ways to draw us back into his love.
Even while we are lost and wandering away from him, God considers how he can draw us into his love. This is a God who loves us without condition. This is a God who is deeply pleased to be with us.
God Enjoys You
Do you believe that God takes great delight in you and loves to spend time with you?
When we grasp God’s joy in being with us, we will be changed from the inside out. Interestingly, discoveries in neuroscience show that God designed our brains to form secure attachments through joy-filled connections.
Just as newborns attach to their caregivers through smiles and loving expressions shared in face-to-face interactions, all attachments are formed through joyful interactions.
This is also true regarding our attachment to our heavenly Father.
The secret to a stronger attachment to God is joyful interaction with him.
This joyful interaction might be as simple as spending five minutes each morning basking in the presence of God and reminding ourselves that he enjoys being with us. It might look like enjoying our hobbies while talking to God and listening to worship music.
During these times, we remind ourselves that God finds pleasure in being with us.
We recognize that we are the sparkle in his eye.
He uses these moments to affirm our identities as his beloved daughters, and he fills our hearts with the confidence we find in his love alone.
When we grasp our unchanging identities as God’s beloved daughters, God’s grace does a work we cannot do for ourselves. His love sets us free from the fear of failure because we no longer find our worth through our performance.
We know that God loves us no matter what.
We are free to fail because we find our identities in God’s love, not our achievements.
God wants to heal your heart, help you overcome your greatest fears, free you from destructive habits, and lead you deeper into his love. Let Lean Into Grace be your guide. #LeanIntoGrace #grace Share on XThese books are free on Kindle Unlimited or available to purchase in print:
God wants to work in your life to accomplish what you’ve been unable to do through willpower alone. Lean Into Grace: Let God’s Grace Heal Your Heart, Refresh Your Soul, and Set You Free shares practical ways to experience God’s freedom, healing, power, and presence in your life. Find this life-changing book as a free eBook on Kindle Unlimited or for 12.99 in print right here. (If you do not have Kindle Unlimited, you can try it out with a free three-month trial!) This book will transform your life and revitalize your relationship with the Lord!
Calling all moms and daughters!
Additionally, my teen daughter, Bekah, and I are passionate about helping moms and daughters grow closer while connecting with God. We have written two mother-daughter devotionals together. Girl to Girl: 60 Mother-Daughter Devotions for a Closer Relationship and Deeper Faith is written for girls ages 7-12. It includes 60 devotions with Scripture, conversation starters, and a shared journaling section after each devotion.
Heart to Heart: A Mother-Daughter Devotional With 50 Devotions for Teen Girls is for teenage girls ages 13-20. It includes 50 devotions, each with a shared journaling section to help moms and daughters connect through writing. This is a great book for moms who want to communicate about awkward topics—like dating, purity, peer pressure, and more—but don’t know where to start. We will help you!
Multitudes of mothers, daughters, mentors, and younger women are being transformed by these books! You can buy them as paperbacks or get your free Kindle Unlimited eBooks on Amazon right here.
