Recently I heard a series of messages given by Dr. Mark Labberton of First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley. All credit here goes to Dr. Labberton. Below are my simple attempts to process the thoughts of this kind pastor. The series of talks was entitled, Strangers in a Strange Land.
The Scripture is from Daniel Chapter 1.
Daniel and his friends made the choice to practice their identity in all that they did. Even though they were offered education, housing, food, they chose to remember God. This was not done in the form of martyrdom, or in grand ritual, but every time they ate, they practiced "remembering" to whom they belonged. Yahweh.
We live in a strange way suspended between our physical world and our spiritual lives. The louder, repeating, resounding, more deafening voice is that of the surrounding secular world. It the midst of this cultural influence tidal wave, we Christian folk have.....Sunday worship, perhaps two hours a week, at most. Hundreds of hours immersed in the world versus a brief time on Sunday, if we can make it, the kids are not playing soccer, or we feel like it.
What a stark contrast. In the face of this, how do we practice our distinct Christian identity? Daniel and his friends chose to remember daily the One who appeared to be abscond, but was daily present in their lives. So what do we do? How is our identity derived? How do we live our lives in terms of hearing a Dominant Voice, that of God Himself? And what determines our identity and our worth? Is it our jobs, our education, our looks, our height, abundance of hair, the goods we own, our social standing, who likes us, how we fit into the social fabric of our community? We need a whole new identity. We need that from Christ....
More coming....
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