One of things that I remember about growing up is that I was never really very confident with who I was.  I remember watching other people all the time and thinking about their personality and their giftedness and really wishing I was more like them.  And so I found myself sometimes trying to take the things that I liked most about other people and trying to add those things to my personality…trying to be like them

Do you ever do this?  I think a lot of us tend to do this…we pick and choose our favorite things about other people and try to add them to our own personality…kind of like we’re at a buffet or something right?

I started mentoring a 4th grade kid through the Mentoring Alliance program here in Tyler, and the first time my family met him, we took him out to dinner, and I asked him what his favorite place to eat was and he said without a doubt that it was China King Buffet…

And so that’s where we went, and I watched him walk around and pick out all of his favorite things…and of course I was doing the same thing.  We’d bypass this item and load up on this other one…or get a little bit of this one and a lot of that one and before long we had this plate of all of our favorite things for us to enjoy.

And sometimes, I think we would love to be able to go to a personality buffet right?

And be able to walk through the buffet line… “I’ll take funny, smart, adventurous, imaginative, charming…”

I mean I think we feel like there are a lot of things we’d like to change about our personalities, and if we could go through and pick out certain things and be those things that we would like ourselves more…be more loved, more valued…people would respect us more and on and on…

But we also do this with our Christian lives as well…

We see this person who seems to share their faith so easily and can build relationships with such ease and we wish we were like them…

Or we see how dedicated they are to studying God’s word and going deep and we wish we were like them…

Or we see how hospitable that person or how this person is such a servant and always doing something behind the scenes or whatever…

And we think, “oh if I could be like them,” then I would be a way better Christian… “I’m sure God is thinking that…if you were more like so and so then you’d be actually making an impact in this world and in advancing my Kingdom, but you’re not!” 

And so this is what we think about ourselves…that we aren’t enough. 

That our personality and our giftedness aren’t enough.  Or we don’t really have anything to offer.

And so a lot of us we end up living a life of trying to make ourselves into someone else… and trying to be like other people in order to feel more respected by others or more respected by God…

OR for some of us, we just get paralyzed and don’t do anything b/c we are too ashamed of who we are.  We don’t like ourselves at all and we wish we were someone different but we can’t really seem to be like the people we wish we were and we just get paralyzed and go into hiding…

This is an identity issue…and so this morning as we continue our identity message series, I want us to take a look at something the apostle Paul says in Ephesians 2.

But we aren’t going to go straight there…I want you to see how he gets there…how he builds up to what he says…so let’s start at the beg…v. 1

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

Paul is talking to the church at Ephesus…so he is talking to people who have put their faith in Jesus for salvation, but he is pointing to a time in their past…he is talking about the time before their salvation…before Christ…and he reminds them that they were spiritually dead before they came to know Christ b/c of sin in their lives.

And so because of this spiritual death and being cut off from God, Paul says that they followed the ways of Satan and this world.  They had to look to the world to find their identity and figure out who they were, and to try to find the life they were missing in being cut off spiritually from God.

And then in vs. 3 Paul broadens this to include not just the church at Ephesus before salvation but to include himself and all of us.  Everyone one of us b/c of indwelling sin is cut-off from God, following the ways of the world and finding our life & identity in the world…and looking to others we respect and trying to make ourselves more like them…

and then Paul concludes by saying that this was part of our nature…in other words that there was nothing we could do about our situation to get out of it…we were slaves, in bondage to sin and the ways of this world…v. 4

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

So that was the state we each were in, BUT GOD decided to something about it… He made us spiritually alive with Christ…by His grace (his unmerited favor) He forgave our sins and sent the Holy Spirit to indwell us, uniting us to Christ and making us spiritually alive.  But that’s not all…

and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

As part of his salvation, He has already spiritually seated us with Jesus in heaven.  And it is b/c of this eternal truth…of eternally being united to Jesus that we can now live life from Him being our point of reference…our Source

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast

Paul makes sure that we know it is only by God’s grace that we are saved…it is not a work of our own…not something we can achieve…it is his work. 

It is given to us through faith…now, each one of us is responsible for putting our faith in Jesus’ finished work on the cross to secure our salvation, but it is His work, not our work which saves.

So listen, these 9 verses that Paul unpacks here is why we have been able to talk over the last several weeks about our identity coming from our innermost part of our being…because a radical transformation has happened there…you were dead spiritually, but God made you alive spiritually…it’s why Paul can refer to you as a new creation in Christ in 2 Cor. 5:17. 

And so we have talked about how that makes your identity that of a child of God, a saint who is completely forgiven, dead to sin, holy and righteous.  So this is one of my most favorite sections of scripture b/c it really shows us who we are outside of Christ and who we become in Christ…

BUT then Paul goes and finishes off this section in a way that really helps us see our identity as whole, I think…and I think it really helps us see more about our identity in regard to our personality and the way He made us. look at verse 10…

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Let’s talk first a little bit about this word, workmanship…we are God’s workmanship…The Greek word Paul used was poiema, and carries the idea of something that has been made.  But it is more than just a general way of describing that something has been made.  As a matter of fact , the word, poiema is where we get our word “poem” from in the English language, and really this Greek word is used only one other time in the New Testament.  It is used in Romans 1:20 where Paul says…

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made…

Underline those last 4 words there, “what has been made.”  Those four words in English right there are one word in Greek, poiema.  Paul says, “God’s eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from “poiema” (what has been made).

So think about what Paul is saying here. He is saying that God’s invisible qualities can be seen in what has been made by Him…that when we look at His creation, we can learn something about who God is…it reveals to us more about who God is.

In other words, the artwork reveals to us something about the Artist…it’s a reflection of Him.

Poiema is the word used to describe God creatively and artistically making things.  It is also translated handiwork and masterpiece.  Paul uses it here in Romans to describe God’s creation and all that He has made…

So picture Niagra Falls, the Grand Canyon, a Hawaiian waterfall, a sunrise or sunset – the stars/the sun/the solar system…these are masterpieces, artistically and creatively made by God…these are God’s POIEMA…

And this is the word Paul uses this word in Eph. 2:10 to describe YOU!    YOU ARE GOD’S POIEMA…YOU ARE ONE OF HIS MASTERPIECES.  It’s like He painted you on a canvas and signed His name at the bottom of it.  You are his workmanship, his handiwork, his masterpiece…

God put you together and gave you your personality and your gifts and calls it a MASTERPIECE…a work of art!

So the next time you find yourself thinking I’m not good enough…I don’t have what it takes, be reminded of this identity truth: that in Christ, you are God’s masterpiece…you are His work of art.

I told you earlier about how I struggled when I was younger with who I was and comparing myself to others and trying to act more like them and pretend to be someone that I wasn’t…

Well I’ve certainly grown in that a lot and especially the more that I’ve seen these identity truths we’ve been talking about this summer and this one today, that I am His masterpiece…

But there are still times that I see other preachers and the way they can captivate an audience and find myself thinking, “man I wish I was more like them.” 

And there have been times when I’ve done the same thing I did when I was young and I’d try to pretend to be them and act like them or talk like them and I’m certainly not saying that we can’t learn things from other people…but ultimately God created us to be us, not someone else…

And the more we believe that truth, the more rest we experience and the more inner peace we will experience…

And the more we will see OUR OWN VALUE IN THE WAY GOD CREATED US INSTEAD OF THINKING ABOUT HOW MUCH MORE VALUABLE WE’D BE IF WE WERE MORE LIKE SO AND SO.

As a matter of fact, look what Paul again after He says that we are God’s workmanship or His masterpieces…

10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Okay, so notice the deep contrast to what Paul said at the beginning of this section.  Paul started off if you remember, talking about how the Ephesians and really all of us were dead, following the ways of this world, deserving of God’s wrath.  So even though we have these bodies and souls that are God’s handiwork…his masterpiece of creation, but we aren’t really capable of using them for what they were created for…which Paul says were for good works, for part of God’s Kingdom work.

So as the sovereign God, He has created these good works for us to walk in, but we can’t walk in them because the part of us which is sensitive to Him and potentially responsive to Him, our spirit, is dead.  So, what did God do? 

He recreated you IN CHRIST so that you could walk in these good works he prepared for you to do!, and Paul walks us through all of these things we read earlier to show us how we have been transformed if we have received Jesus thru faith…we have been made alive, spiritually seated in heaven…

So now, being responsive to God through our spirit, we can walk in the good works he prepared for us to do WITH THESE PERSONALITIES AND GIFTS THAT HE’S GIVEN US.

Do you see what I’m saying?  God is not asking you to change anything about you and your personality so that He can do bigger and better good works through you…He is just wanting you to be you…

He put Jesus in you so that Jesus could live His life AS YOU.  Do you see that?

He artistically made you the way you are, so that Jesus could live through you w/your personality and your talents and your gifts…not someone else’s!

In his book, “The Rest of the Gospel,” Dan Stone says this…

“Lord, you’ve made the outer person that I am.  You live in that person, and you set that person in the world in a way that’s going to attract some people to You.  I’m not going to attract everybody.  The ones you don’t attract through me, you’ll catch through someone else.”  That’s why we all fit together isn’t it?  We fit together as a whole.  Nobody can attract everybody.  I used to try to attract everybody.  But there are all kinds of fruit. There are oranges. There are apples. There are lemons. God uses all kinds. I say to people, “I am a lemon.” God attracts some through my lemonness.

God says that you are a masterpiece in Christ…not that you’ll be a masterpiece if you adopt someone else’s personality and try to be more like them…No, no, you are God’s handiwork, His masterpiece, a work of art with your God-given personality and gifts and talents…

So quit trying to be someone else and just be you…allow Christ to live His life through you AS YOU (not the person you wish you were or that you think you need to be).

And listen, when we begin to appreciate who we are in Christ and the works that He prepared for us to do (not someone else), then not only will we have more peace and enjoy what He is doing in and through us BUT we will also begin to appreciate other people as well.

B/C God made all kinds of masterpieces…Some of us are deep thinkers and some of us are deep feelers…and all kinds of in-betweens…we might be described as being funny, smart, deep, abstract, concrete, adventurous, dependable, observant, optimistic, reliable, imaginative, charming, and on and on…all different…but all masterpieces.

And so as we walk by the Spirit, He will lead us to recognize them as masterpieces as well.  We will recognize that Christ is living in them AS them and instead of being jealous or thinking about all of the ways they need to change the things that annoy us, we will appreciate that Jesus can use that to attract people to Him that He isn’t going to reach through us.

So, let’s rest in who we are today and who Christ made us to be…and let’s allow Him to express His life in us and through us in the way that He made us… let’s let Him live His life as us…and let’s also celebrate the uniqueness of each other and the way He works through us together to reach people with His love and His mercy and His grace.