Who Are You Really?

No More Delay: What Are You Waiting For | Day 8

"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light." 1 Peter 2:9, NIV

A warm welcome to you this morning. Most of us have received a piece of mail addressed to a name we no longer use, or sent to an address where we have not lived in years. It catches our attention for a moment, because it belongs to a chapter of life that has already closed. It tells us who we once were. It no longer tells us who we are. This morning we look at what God says about who we are now, and at how completely settled that question already is.

Who God Says We Are

The world is quick to hand us labels, and we are quick to accept them. Some of us identify ourselves by our career, others by our accomplishments, our failures, our health, or the opinions of others. Even in the Christian life we can slip into the same habit, measuring ourselves by how useful we feel, or how well we believe we are serving the Lord. Every one of those labels eventually fades, and not one of them tells us the truth about who we are. God does that, and he has already spoken.

Peter was writing to Christians living as strangers in places that had little use for their faith. He did not encourage them by pointing to their abilities, their numbers, or their circumstances. He reminded them of what God had already declared them to be. "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light." (1 Peter 2:9, NIV). These are not titles anyone earns. They are not rewards for faithful service or goals we are still working toward. They are gifts of grace, describing believers exactly as God already sees them because of Jesus Christ. Through faith in our Savior, God has claimed us as his own treasured people, not because we deserved it, but because of his mercy alone.

Peter continues with one of the most beautiful contrasts in Scripture. "Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." (1 Peter 2:10, NIV). Once, but now. Once we were separated from God by our sin. Once we wandered without hope. Once we stood under condemnation. But now, in Christ, everything has changed. We belong to the family of God. We have received the mercy we could never have earned. Our identity no longer rests on our past, because God's grace has given us an entirely new future.

How did that happen? Certainly not because we made ourselves worthy of it. Paul says it plainly. "But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit," (Titus 3:4-5, NIV). Our salvation is God's work from beginning to end. His kindness reached us long before we ever reached for him, and his mercy rescued us when we could not have rescued ourselves. Through his powerful Word, and through the washing of Holy Baptism, the Holy Spirit brought us into God's family and gave us the new life Christ won for us.

That is why Paul can also write what he does to the Galatians. "So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." (Galatians 3:26-27, NIV). What a picture that is. We have been clothed with Christ himself. When our heavenly Father looks at us, he sees the perfect righteousness of his Son covering every sin, every failure, and every regret we have carried. Our confidence does not rest on how well we have lived for Jesus. It rests on what Jesus has already accomplished for us.

Even when doubts work their way into our hearts, God does not leave us to sort it out alone. "The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory." (Romans 8:16-17, NIV). What comfort those words bring on a hard morning. Our identity is not something we create or maintain by our own effort. The Holy Spirit keeps pointing us back to Christ through the Gospel, assuring us that we belong to our heavenly Father and that an eternal inheritance is waiting for us because of his grace.

Called Out of Darkness for a Reason

Only after all of that does Peter mention what we are here to do. We are God's special possession, that we may declare the praises of him who called us out of darkness into his wonderful light. Notice the order, because the joy of it sits entirely there. We do not declare God's praises in order to become his people. We declare his praises because we already are his people. Our witness does not earn God's love. It overflows from hearts that have already received it. We speak because we were first spoken to, and we share because we were first given the greatest gift there is.

There is also great encouragement in that phrase royal priesthood, especially for those of us who have quietly assumed this work belongs to someone more qualified. In the old covenant a priest stood between God and everyone else. Now every believer has direct access to the Father through Christ, and every believer carries a message that is fully his. The public preaching of the Word remains Christ's own gift to his church, entrusted to the men he calls, and our congregations need far more of them than they have. But the rest of us were never handed a smaller version of this name. We hold the whole of it, in kitchens and break rooms and driveways, wherever God has already placed us.

Every one of these names finds its source in Jesus Christ. "He himself bore our sins" in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; "by his wounds you have been healed." For "you were like sheep going astray," but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. (1 Peter 2:24-25, NIV). Jesus did not simply improve our lives. By his perfect life, his innocent suffering, his sacrificial death, and his glorious resurrection, he changed our standing before God completely and brought wandering sheep home to their Shepherd. He gave us a name we could never have claimed on our own, and he holds it for us still.

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for making me your own through the saving work of Jesus Christ. When I am tempted to define myself by my failures, my fears, or the opinions of others, remind me that my identity rests completely in your mercy. Thank you for washing me, for clothing me in your Son, and for calling me your child when I had nothing to offer you.

Lord Jesus, thank you for bearing my sins and bringing me back to you as my Good Shepherd. Fill my heart with joy as I remember who I am because of your grace, and give me glad words today for someone who still needs to hear the wonderful news of your salvation. In your holy name I pray. Amen.

The world will keep handing you labels, and some of them will arrive on days you are least able to argue with them. Let them come. Those are old envelopes addressed to someone who no longer exists, and the God who gave you your real name is not in the habit of taking it back. You are his people. You have received his mercy. You belong to him forever, and nothing in this world can change what your gracious Savior has already declared to be true. Tomorrow we turn to a vine and its branches, and to the good news that fruit in the Christian life was never something we had to produce on our own.

To God be the glory.

Pray, praise, and give thanks, for God is good and His mercy endures forever.

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