At my previous church, there was a well-known adage concerning three of the pastors. Pastor Wade, the senior pastor, was the glass half full pastor. The RUF campus minister/church planter, Pastor Ben, was glass half empty. And Pastor Jon? He didn’t think there was any glass on the table, a pointer to my tendency to pessimism. It was an accurate reflection of all three of us.  

This past Sunday, I opened the sermon talking about Admiral James Stockdale and the paradox associated with him. This paradox arose out of the eight years he spent as a prisoner in a POW camp. It states that it is a technique to navigate challenging and ambiguous times by combining the ability to confront the brutal facts of your current reality, even as you maintain unwavering faith that you will prevail in the end, no matter how distant that is. Being brutally honest about our situation is usually viewed as taking stock of how hard or difficult the situation is (and that was the emphasis in the sermon). But I think it is also a call to remember and live out of the good parts of our lives as well.

The Scriptures have much to say about who we are in Christ. But too often we downplay or forget those truths. For example, one of our covenant children asked me after church why I call the people in the church “saints” (I wrote a blog post about that a couple of years ago). The main reason I do is because that is what the Bible says we are. However, because we feel the weight of our sin, we minimize that truth. But if we are to live in the fullness of reality, then we must embrace our status as saints.

In 1 Peter alone, there are some wonderful statements about who we are. Here’s a list of some:

• We are chosen (1:1)
• We are foreknown by the Father (1:2)
• We are set apart by the Spirit (1:2)
• We are sprinkled with the blood of Jesus (1:2)
• We have been born again to a living hope (1:3)
• We have an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading (1:4)
• We are being guarded by God’s power (1:5)

And that’s just in the first five verses. And these are not statements pertaining to the future but concerning our present reality.  

Or consider this well-known passage from chapter 2:

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy (vv. 9-10).

Saints, this is who we are NOW! Yes, we need to be brutally honest about our weaknesses and the state of our world. But we also need to be as brutally honest about our identity in Christ and the vast resources He has given us. Doing both is what is required to navigate this world as strangers and exiles. And in doing so, our lives will resound to the glory of God.