How do you identify a Christian?

Is it the cross around their neck, or the one on their back? Who they exclude or who they include? Their love for one another, or their love for the outcast? Their Church attendance or their resemblance to Jesus? The regurgitation of scripture or the living of it? Their tattered Bible or the one they gave away?

How do you identify a Christian?

February’s trip to India stripped me of three of my favorite things.

1. My small diamond and ruby cross necklace which was really more of a plus sign, but it meant something to me. I lost it on our way to the new church in the hills
2. My personal note ridden, memory-laden calfskin Bible.
3. My perception of who I was.

The first two were outward status symbols of who I am… they identified to the rest of the world that I follow Jesus, I mean look, I’m wearing a cross, right? I’ve been in BSF (never mind that I hadn’t been in 3 years) after all, look at my Bible.

I didn’t know that giving it away would make me feel so… new. Not new in “He makes all things new” but “new”…. New Christian new. You don’t know anything new. Put her in a beginner’s class new. Let’s see how long she lasts new.

I also had no idea how much I would love this, and hate this. It is the fight between Spirit and flesh.

Until I heard the crackling sound of new pages being opened on my new Bible and stared at the clean crisp unread pages, I hadn’t realized how reliant I had become on the old highlights. The old notes. The old revelations, and the old ideas.

I felt lost.

But if His Word is alive and active, and I believe it is, I’ve been missing out for awhile. Missing out on hearing His voice fresh in my heart with new paths for Jesus and I to journey together.

I’ve read Mark 5 so many times, yet yesterday I was completely overwhelmed by the tenderness of Jesus to the point of tears, and all I could do was sing, and weep, and sing some more. For in it, He turned and he saw me. He healed me. He took my hand. He called me daughter. He called me “little girl”. He called me “beloved”. He called me His.

He called me. Again.

Personally. One on one. Because that’s how Jesus is. He’s personal. He’s relational. He’s tender. He meets me right where I am at any given moment with love and understanding, and he takes my hand and calls me daughter. He tells me I don’t need to be afraid, ever.

It’s a new season. Of learning, of growth, of revelation and the letting go of the old ideas. Even the good ones. Of being new.

Love, Val