If then you have been raised with Christ…
Colossians 3:1

Put On
 A Resurrection Identity

Have you been raised from the dead? This is an odd question, because we have not yet physically died. How then can we be raised with Christ if we have yet to die? This is the same question Nicodemus wrestled with in John 3:1-15: How can we be born again? How can we be raised with Christ?

Lent begins today; 40 days* of repentance, reflection, fasting, prayer, and worship. What do our hearts desire for the next 40 days until Easter Sunday? Have we put on our resurrection identity? What is our identity, where is our identity found?

The word identity has become a very important word in our culture – how does one identify? Some people identify by gender, some by sexuality, still others by the passports they hold or the place they were born. While these things all contribute to who we are, they are not paramount to our identity. The Apostle Paul tells us that we must be raised with Christ – that is our identity. (Just as Christ told Nicodemus, we must be reborn into a new life.)

During the next 40 days, we ought to spend time focusing on our identity in Christ first and foremost. If we as a church, as the body of Christ, were to solidify our identity in the resurrection of Christ (that in conquering death he brought us all life), what a powerful season of Lent we could experience together! If we as the church were focused chiefly on our resurrection to new life, our present circumstances might not become the focus of obsessions and doubt. To focus on the resurrection for 40 days may indeed give us freedom from worries, doubts and momentary afflictions. Perhaps a focus on Christ would grow our individual and communal joy with one another in Christ.

However, before we grow as a church, we must each choose for ourselves to put on a resurrection identity. Your spouse cannot do this for you, your parents cannot help you, no one can choose this for you. Have you been raised with Christ? Jesus has offered this resurrection to each of us. God has given his Son that you might be free. This is his best gift to you, his child.

“Man finds it hard to get what he wants, because he does not want the best; God finds it hard to give, because he would give the best, and man will not take it.”
 – George MacDonald

To begin our Lenten season together – let us all put on first our resurrection identity, the best and most precious gift God has offered us. Let our Lenten repentance, reflection, fasting, prayer, and worship all be practiced with the new life given to us by our loving God.  

* Lent is 40 days excluding Sundays.