mocking identity

kristin did a really good devotion this morning. we reflected on john 19--and how jesus was tortured....they set a crown of thorns on His head and they mocked his identity. They made fun of his kingship with a instrument of torture...they treated a king like a criminal. and while he received their torture..we did not speak or defend himself...he received it, submitted to it and said very little really. but what we can also assume though it is not said....these attacks on his identity did not actually affect his identity as a king or affect how he felt about his own identity and purpose in the world at that moment. he sumbitted but was not made less in his submission and then from the cross he asked for forgiveness for those who knew not what they did...

sort of just ripped my face off....assaults on my identity happen everyday. i am often tempted to believe them...often i think that i am my own worst enemy...my own assaults on my identity are the worst.

reflecting on what i wrote yesterday i think this fits in...violence of any kind is an assault on our identity and the human response to assaults on our identity is anger and retrobution...but that was not christ's example. the identity of the western world was assaulted on 9/11...our power and wealth was assaulted ...which forgive me for saying this but power and wealth has become the identity of the west so what has been our response? violence and assaults on the identity of the muslim people...call them things like "evil doers" etc. like a said a normal human response but not the response of Jesus. the hindus and the muslims continue to fight and harm one another because each has determined that the value of the others life is less...they see each other as lessor people (the only place i do not see this division is in the red light district--a culture which knows no religion and every religion)

Read 2 peter

we have our identity established...we are the chosen race, a royal priesthood, a people for God own possesion that we may declare the excellencies of him who called out of the darkness and into the light

we have a model for how to live..for it is comendable if a man bears up under suffering because he concious of God....when they hurled their insults as he him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats, instead he entrusted himself to him who judges justly...by his wounds we are healed (the whole world can have this healing but who will model what it is supposed to look like??)

i am reminded that my identity even when under assault, can not be diminshed or stolen because it is secure not established by how i look, what i own, or how important a job i have....i remember the words of jesus, you can take nothing from me because i give it to you freely.