Who Am I, Really?

[00:00:05] Hey everybody, it's Pastor Chuck, and thanks so much for joining me on today's weekday podcast, where I want to talk about who am I really? [00:00:13] So welcome back. I'm glad you've joined me on today's weekday podcast. I want to invite you into a question. Not a churchy question, like a really human question. Who am I? Not the version with the resume. We're not the version with the filters and oh, I'm fine. The real you. The 2am I can't sleep. Replaying the conversations, ruminating about the problems you Centuries before Jesus ever rode that donkey into Jerusalem, a poet king named David sat under the night sky. And he asked it like this in Psalm 8, 3, and 4. When I look at the night sky and see the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars you set in place, what are mere mortals that you should think about them? Human beings that you should care for them? [00:00:58] Who am I? [00:01:00] This is not self hatred or loathing. This is not I'm trash. God is great. [00:01:05] This is awe. This is wonder. This is amazement. A person looking out at a universe that is huge and then realizing that the God who spun all of that into being knows your name. [00:01:18] Fast forward a thousand years. Dusty road, crowded city gate. Man on a donkey riding toward a cost as he's riding toward that cross. [00:01:28] The people on the roadside. [00:01:30] They're not the spiritual elites. They're not the sick, the poor, the overlooked, the woman pushed to the margins, the gentiles, outsiders, the tax collectors everybody hated. The sinners, everyone avoided. And Jesus rides in with all of them on his mind. And you. Your story, your secrets, your regrets, your questions. Who am I that you keep me on your mind? John 3:16 We've seen on billboards. We've seen it in end zones and football games. It's almost background noise to us now. But listen to it again slowly. [00:02:02] For this is how God loved the world. [00:02:06] He gave his one and only Son so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. [00:02:18] The world, y'. All. Not the spiritually impressive, not the politically aligned, not the theological insiders. The world. All of it. Every race, every story, every personality type, every person whose life looks put together on the outside, and every person whose life is clearly visibly falling apart, including you. [00:02:38] So let me ask you a different version of the same question. [00:02:40] What if you really believed, like, deep in your bones, that you're someone God thinks about, not someone that God tolerates, Not that he puts up with you or literally just thinks about, delights in what would that do to our anxiety, or to the shame that we carry? Or to the need to impress people who barely know us? [00:03:04] Some of us listening have been handed a version of religion that says you're basically a disappointment to God and he's just waiting for you to finally shape up and get it right. [00:03:13] Palm Sunday, though, tells a totally different story. It says Jesus moved toward us long before we ever moved toward him. It says love rode into the city before anybody repented, before anybody got it, before anybody signed a statement of faith. It says, your belonging came before your believing. [00:03:34] Let me say that again. It says that your belonging came before your believing. So maybe today, instead of asking, who am I to God, like it's a question of worth, you ask it like David did, with awe. Who am I that you think of me? [00:03:48] Who am I that you would ride into that city and keep going all the way to the cross with my name on your mind? [00:03:55] And then you answer it with not a resume, but with gratitude, God, I'm just grateful for you. Grateful that I matter to you. Grateful that in a world that measures everything beautiful, beauty, money, followers, performance, you've already called me loved and accepted. [00:04:12] That's it for today. That's a lot. [00:04:15] But let that sentence ride with you today. I matter to God not because of what you've done, but because of what he's done. [00:04:23] We'll talk tomorrow. And until then, walk through your day like someone God literally cannot stop thinking about. Because he loves you. God bless you, friend. Thanks so much for joining me on today's weekday podcast.