Identities
Every person views themselves through a particular lens. Most people use lenses like money, acceptance, family, or success (among many others) to understand themselves. Because of what Christ has done for us, we have been fundamentally changed. Our identities are how we see ourselves in light of the gospel.
Family
“Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father.’” God has always been raising up a people–an earthly family–who would live in such a way that the world would know what he is like. Jesus once said that those who live in his ways and obey his Father are truly his family. Through Jesus, we believe that we are children of God and brothers and sisters with each other. As family, we see it as our obligation to personally care for the needs of one another, both physically and spiritually. We disciple, nurture, and hold each other accountable to this Covenant life together.
Missionaries
God sent his son, Jesus, to Earth to take on human form and live within the culture. He worked, ate, and interacted among the people, teaching all of them about his Father. God has made us missionaries like Jesus. Regardless of the land we live in, we should all live as sojourners, learning the language of the people around us that we might use it to preach the gospel. We have been made Jesus’ light-bearers in a dark world; wherever we go, the light comes with us. We want to live with this reality before us, that all of life – ourselves, our relationships, our money, etc. – might be given over to God’s redemptive mission.
Servants
Jesus is God, and yet he humbled himself “even to death on a cross” as he served the very ones who hated him. In describing his mission on earth, he once said, “the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” It follows then, that if Jesus’ people are included in his mission in any way, they must become servants as he was. In Christ, we have been freed from the bondage of sin so that we might no longer live for ourselves, but for him who for our sake died and was raised. We say with the Apostle Paul, “We are servants of Christ Jesus.”
Learners
After Jesus rose from the dead, he charged his disciples to “make disciples of all nations” and to “teach them to obey everything I have commanded you.” Becoming a disciple of Jesus necessarily means that we are turned into life-long learners. Through mining the depths of Scripture and seeing how God’s Word intersects with our lives, we gradually become more and more aware of who God is, how we should relate to him and the world, and what it means to obey everything that he has commanded. As learners, we want to have steady, enduring, voracious appetites for growth as the Spirit informs our hearts and minds.