Our identity is often tied up in our roles and relationships.

A few years ago each member of a small group was handed a brown paper lunch bag. They were asked to bring it back the next week with items inside to help the group get to know one another. The challenge was that they were not to refer to the roles they have. Instead, they were asked to fill it with things that with things that represented each of them as individuals. If you were to introduce yourself this way, what would go into your bag?

How do you define yourself? Take our free lesson to find out.

“And Laban had two daughters: the name of the elder was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah was tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well favored.” (Genesis 29:16-17, KJV)

Have you ever been the victim of rejection? Have you ever felt like you were a contestant in a game of favorites and lost? If anyone knew the pain of rejection, it was Leah. She was treated differently because she was not as attractive as her sister. Talk about hurting your self-esteem! Can you imagine how much Leah must have hurt knowing that she was not loved as much because of her looks? Rejection is painful!

Maybe you’ve never faced that kind of rejection. Perhaps your rejection is of a different sort. Could it be that you were fired from a job because “the other woman” was a suck-up? Maybe you’ve eaten your lunch alone because you weren’t popular enough to eat with the “in crowd.” Perhaps your loved one walked out on you because he found “someone better.” At some point in our lives, we have all faced rejection.

The good news is that God knows all about our rejection. He knows how much we hurt. He knows all about our heavy hearts. He knows, and He cares. If you’ll read on in chapter 29 of Genesis, you’ll see how God dealt with Leah’s rejection.

“And when the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb: but Rachel was barren. . .And she conceived again, and bare a son: and she said, ‘Now will I praise the Lord: therefore she called his name Judah’; and left bearing.” (Genesis 29:31,35, KJV)

Not only did the Lord give Leah children, He gave her Judah, the child that would be the start of the line of Christ. What a gift! True, Leah may have been rejected by her family and friends, but God never rejected her.

The same can be said for us. Many times it seems like we don’t have a friend to stand with us. At times, we can be brought so low that we wonder if anyone really cares. Well, I’m here to remind each of us that God does care. He will never reject us! After all, we were ugly in our trespasses and sin, yet He still sent His only Son to die for us. Now that’s true love!

Questions: Do you feel rejected? How can you learn from Leah’s story about God’s love?

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“Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.”" Matthew 26:36-38

Transparency is an oft – overlooked element in our growing closer to Jesus Christ. Intimacy with the Lord requires our full, humble, and honest openness before Him.

Jesus Himself was a wonderful model of openness as He dealt with His disciples. For instance, we read in today’s Bible verse that, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus shared with the disciples His anguish over His upcoming crucifixion and brief separation from God the Father.

Knowing that the sins of the entire world were about to be cast upon Him, Jesus grieved, even to point of near death. Here was God, clothed in human flesh, being completely honest, open, and forthright about His emotions. This is how Christ would have us react to Him.

A proud, arrogant, egotistical, self – sufficient Christianity bristles at the thought of such transparency. Why should I burden God with this when I can handle it myself? I’m just not going to deal with God about this. Such thinking and behavior goes against everything for which God created us.

However, God cherishes and honors a humble, contrite spirit from someone trying to be himself or herself before the Lord. Confess sin, worry, doubt, and fear. He already knows all, but your willingness to intimately share with Him all the details speaks volumes about the bent of your heart.

Question: Where do you find it easiest to have “intimacy” (quiet time) with God?

I lost my dad to suicide at the age of five.

No matter how much I tried to get better, I kept falling flat on my face. The unbearable anxiety and suicidal thoughts occupied my soul. The ugly reflection from my mirror flooded my mind with atrocious lies. You are never going to get well! You will remain living with this hell! You will never escape and be free! I picked up drinking again, hoping to find relief. Escaping from the monster in the mirror forced me to run towards things even more gruesome.

I needed a way out

Then one night my turbulent way of living caught up with me. I couldn’t handle my extreme highs, lows, and the stack of baffling conditions I juggled. I didn’t want to continue on the wild roller coaster ride any longer. I couldn’t handle the disabling hours in the bathroom, nor tolerate the self-destructive behavior in the bars. I felt ashamed of my life and needed the madness to end. Out of dire desperation, I prayed to God.

“God, I don’t want to wake up to see another day. I’d rather be dead! If you must keep me alive, then you have to help me get better. Please rescue me from this misery! God, let me die!”

To my surprise, when I awoke the following morning, I prayed to God to guide me into a church. It was Sunday morning and for some odd reason I longed to be in his presence. I fought a dreadful conflict in the bathroom as I prepared myself to get ready. The tormenting obsessions nearly destroyed me but I survived the onslaught, the hideous grooming ritual.

As I got into my car, a strange feeling encompassed me. I had no idea which church I was heading to. As I drove down the street, it felt as though a gentle hand was chauffeuring me. I pulled up along the side of an unfamiliar church. I hesitated for a moment, deciding whether to park my car or not. Is this the one? Look at all the people. Will they stare at me because I’m ugly? Should I go in or not? Within a few seconds, an incredible sensation empowered me, urging me inside.

Finding relief in a church

As I walked towards the entrance, several parishioners greeted me with open arms. This made me feel welcomed, so relieved. I found a seat and immediately participated in the singing taking place. I’d never done this before, but my heart longed to connect. The songs were uplifting and joyous.  I cried as I joined in. I don’t recall the exact message spoken, but it infiltrated my heart. As service was about to end, the pastor asked everyone to close their eyes and bow their heads for prayer. After a minute or two of prayer, he announced an altar call, something unfamiliar to me.

He asked, “Is there anyone who would like to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior? Please raise your hand.”

Without hesitation, I raised my hand.  I knew in my heart, right there and then, that I needed Jesus Christ in my life. I had no idea the pastor was going to ask all of us, who raised their hands, to go up for additional prayer. Right away, I walked up to the front. The pastor had me recite a special prayer, accepting Jesus Christ as my Lord.

Shortly after, elders of the church prayed over me. Tears poured down my face as we prayed together. Later, as I walked towards my car, I felt different. I didn’t feel dirty and ugly. I wasn’t troubled! I feel like I was finally alive!

Everything changed

Something inside me vanished. I felt all cleaned up inside. The obsessions and anxiety disappeared. For the first time in years, I felt good about myself in a healthy way, not in a self-destructive manner. I attended church on a weekly basis. I began to break out of the shell I was locked up in. The greatest feeling anyone could ever experience—imagine a prisoner, set free after being wrongfully locked up for over thirty years.

If you feel lost there is hope for you. There is hope for the aching heart that can not love. There is hope to the one that might be thinking about taking their life. Cry out to God and He will send you help.

For God says, “At just the right time, I heard you. On the day of salvation, I helped you.” (2 Corinthians 6:2)

God is ready to help you right now. Today is the day of salvation.

Do you want to accept Jesus just as Barbara did? All you need to do is pray. Prayer is just talking to God. There is no right or wrong way to do it. God is not concerned about the words that you choose, he cares about the state of your heart. He hears you, the words aren’t that important. You can pray a prayer something like this:

Jesus, I want to know you personally. I know that I am a sinner and that nothing I could do can make up for that. Thank you for dying in my place and paying the price for my sin. I know that my sin doesn’t separate me from God anymore. Thank you for forgiving me. I know that you love me and that I will spend eternity with you. I want you to be my Savior. Come into my life and take control, make me the person you want me to be.

God invites us into relationship with him. He’s not here to condemn, although our sin makes us guilty. God is inviting us back, ready to welcome us home.

“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20

God spoke you into your mother’s womb at just the right time for you to be here now. It wasn’t by accident, nor was it a pleasant surprise to God; he designed you on purpose to be on mission with him for such a time as this.

Your faith will grow stronger as you focus on your identity in Christ. What this means is that you abandon any image of yourself that is not from God. You stop believing what others have said about you; you stop believing how others have labeled you; you stop accepting how others have defined you.

Where I’m going is here – if you don’t know who you are, then you’re vulnerable to other people telling you who you are. But the concrete, solid, gospel truth is that you are who God says you are and no one else has a vote in the matter.

You are now identified with Christ and have the power of the Holy Spirit within you. You are God’s precious child and he created you in a way that pleases him.

This “identity issue” is an important part of living the abundant life. Jesus was able to face the incredible demands of his mission because he’d settled this identity issue. He knew exactly who he was; he knew that he mattered immensely to his Heavenly Father, and that gave him confidence to move purposefully in faith.

What does this mean?
· God wants you to be you – You can relax knowing that being yourself is exactly what God wants of you. A pencil brings glory to God by being a pencil. But, if you take a pencil and try to use it like a screwdriver, it won’t work and you’ll likely break the pencil. You will find the stress drained from your life when you stop trying to be somebody you’re not and instead start being who God purposefully designed you to be.
· Believe God calls you by name – God didn’t call you as part of a blanket invitation; he called you specifically by name. You are his masterpiece, a work of his own hands. Like many earthly fathers, God feels pleasure when he sees you just being you.
· Believe you are who God says you are – No one else has a vote on who you are. You are free to be you instead of imitating someone else. You are free to use your unique, God-given gifts and there is no need to compare your gifts to the gifts of others. No one else is in competition to be you!

Question: Where are the places in your life where you’re still trying to be someone other than who God shaped you to be?

Sometimes I think there are two people living in this body. One is positive thinking, ready to take on the world. The other is scared, always hiding where it’s safe. I like positive Phil. He’s fun to be around, people respect him and he makes a difference. Scared Phil, on the other hand, I loathe. He believes he has failed even before he tries. He believes people tolerate him. I want positive Phil to live and scared Phil to die.

So why does scared Phil keep showing up? How do I get rid of him, permanently? It’s like he’s handcuffed to me and I’m stuck with him until one of us has served his time. Why is positive Phil missing when I need him most? He comes, visits, then goes back to where ever he came from.

When I was a kid, I wanted my own section of the garden. Dad gave me a row and I planted what I wanted in my row. Tomatoes, bell peppers and corn. Having my own row in the garden meant I was responsible for the care of the row.

I’d come home from school, go out to the garden and water my row. Every day I hoped to see one of the plants poking up out of the ground. Four or five days had passed, I had watered them as I was taught and still, there wasn’t a sprout to be seen. I grew frustrated. This garden wasn’t fun anymore. It was work. It wasn’t long until I was giving my bike the attention my garden needed. My plants didn’t grow well. They didn’t produce much and what they did produce wasn’t very good. I had a good crop of weeds, though. I wanted to have a good garden, but wanting didn’t get me a good garden.

What if the two Phils are like my garden? What am I doing to nurture positive Phil? Or have I grown impatient because I haven’t seen results after a couple of days? One thing’s for sure, scared Phil grows, even when I’m not trying to grow him. Growing positive Phil is hard work. I want positive Phil to grow, but just wanting won’t make it happen.

However, I don’t have to work alone in growing positive Phil. There is Someone who wants to help. Someone who is able to do much more than just want. “And I am sure that God, who began this good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on that day when Christ Jesus comes back again.” (Philippians 1:6 NLT)

Father God,
In Your Word, You’ve told me what it takes to grow up to be Your man. But it’s hard and I get frustrated and impatient when I don’t see immediate results. Give me courage to live for You when I’m scared. Give me strength to keep going when I’m weak and tired. Finish the work You’ve started in me.
In Jesus’ name, amen.

Questions: Do you feel the pull between being a confident man and a frightened man? How does knowing that God is committed to completing the good work He began in you help you today?