(remember, these are unedited/draft show notes, not a transcript — listening is always better — and if you listen AND follow along below, you’ll see why)
Focus Question:
How do you be come “community you?”
Intro:
If you’re like most people, you probably at some point in your life wanted to be part of a group — football team, cheerleader, cool kids down the block. Maybe it was just a couple other girls playing dolls and you wanted to be included.
And let’s just say, for the sake of a thought experiment, that you got there. You’re part of that group. Being part of that group meant having an identity. But my question for you is, “Did having identity as part of the group mean losing your identity as self?”
If we think about things from a Christian perspective, I think the Bible’s clear that we don’t lose one to gain the other. And this is rather countercultural, at least here in the west, where the assertion of self is seen as nearly supreme, and therefore what stands in the way of self is deemed evil.
NEW TESTAMENT SEGMENT:
As we turn to our NT segment today, if we take a step back to look at the big picture, we’re in the middle of a journey…a journey that Luke paints of what happens as Jesus heads toward Jerusalem. And particularly, as you’ll hear today and for the next few, there’s a lot to the story about identity — what it means to one of God’s adopted children. A Christian or Jesus-follower, if you will. And we’ll wrap up today with another little peek at this via our focus question, “How do you become a “community you?”
Passage: Luke 14
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses: 35
Words: ~748
ORIGINAL TESTAMENT SEGMENT:
Our OT segment today is going to be really short, finishing up an account of David’s various wars, because the next chunk of story is longer than we have time for today.
Passage: 1 Chronicles 19-20
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses: 27
Words: ~531
If you happen to be a longtime co-journeyer here as we read through the Bible, you might recall that what we just read spans a timeline that, elsewhere in the Bible, included David’s foibles with Bathsheba and other stuff. Remember…
Typical of the Chronicler, he omitted the embarrassing incident of David’s sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam 11) and left out the account of Absalom’s rebellion (2 Sam 13–19). Chronicles passes over these accounts because they do not serve its purpose. The Chronicler overlooked moral defeats and highlighted David’s victories to draw attention to God’s sovereignty in David’s life. God succeeded in using David to fulfill His purposes for him. David’s greatest accomplishments were not political but spiritual—moving the ark to Jerusalem and preparing for the construction of the temple.(1)
Wisdom SEGMENT:
Passage: Proverbs 12:23-
Translation: CSB (Christian Standard Bible)
Verses:
Words: ~
THE BOTTOM LINE:
The lesson from the Chronicler is, I think, and important one related to today’s focus question — How do you become a “community you?”
Here’s why I think so. Give me permission to take a side road to get there.
Socially, we notice what we lose before we notice what we gain. It’s part of why change is so hard. Elsewhere on this podcast you’ve heard me tell my story — I thought I’d give up a lot of fun and have to be associated with a bunch of boring people if not the ones who call themselves Christians and do really stupid stuff. And to be sure, there is a cost to being a Jesus-follower.
More importantly, though, is that what we experience, is transformation. Which literally means “formation across.” From here to there. Like the well-worn, but quite-apt, analogy of a butterfly.
And I think, kind of like the Chronicler choosing what to focus on, that part of our transformation is growing more toward thinking God’s thoughts after Him. Like Paul writing to the Philippians to set their hearts and minds on the good, true, and beautiful. It doesn’t change the past, it transforms how we see it.
And the crazy thing about a new identity in Christ is, as Paul writes in Romans 12, a renewal of the mind and conformed to the image of God. So as the church does this, you become more a part of the community at the same time you become more you. But it’s receiving, not achieving. And approval of you and your gifts is given, not gained. You’ve got a unique role that is more unique and special as you grow in community. We even see this is a biblical marriage.
It’s rather counter-cultural. Isn’t God’s beautiful?
When God is your everything, you lose nothing.
ForTheHope is a daily audio Bible + apologetics podcast and blog. We’ve got a passion for just keepin’ it real, having conversations like normal people, and living out the love of Jesus better every single day.
Roger Courville, CSP is a globally-recognized expert in digitally-extended communication and connection, an award-winning speaker, award-winning author, and a passionately bad guitarist. Follow him on Twitter -- @RogerCourville and @JoinForTheHope – or his blog: www.forthehope.org.
Sources and resources:
(1) David S. Dockery, ed., Holman Bible Handbook (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 1992), 273.