Knowing The Next Generation
- Understanding Youth Culture (1)
- Cracking The Easter Code (2)
- Responding Well (3)
- A Secure Identity (5)
The issues around identity are becoming increasingly acute in our culture and are one of the key pressures facing our young people. We will come across this in our churches and youth groups today, if we have not already. It may be our young people battling with who they are, who the world says they are and who God says they are through his Word; or our young people may be dealing with these issues in their friendship groups; or grappling with the views of ‘inclusion’ promoted in their schools and the world around them.
Unstable foundations
The voices of the world primarily take one aspect of who a person is – whether it’s around sexual orientation, gender identity, race, etc – and makes that the one overriding ‘truth’ that defines them. They teach that to find our ‘true’ identity we look inside us and base our ‘identity’ on what we feel is right or best for us. This is why identity issues are so contentious because by challenging this view, we are seen to be challenging the very core of who a person is.
The other option people have in forming their identity is to be dependent on what others think and how they fit into or meet the expectations of others. Both these foundations are incredibly unstable. Feelings change and the standards we set, or we allow others to set, will never be reached. Therefore, our identity crumbles.
A better story
The Bible offers a much better and more secure story. The creation story teaches us that our identities are given to us as image-bearers of God (Gen. 1:27). Like everything after the fall, our experience of our identities has been marred by sin. Yet that is not the end of the story. God is working in, and redeeming, all our experiences and struggles (Rom. 8:28; Phil. 2:13; Col. 1:29). In Christ, we have a new identity that includes every part of our being. As Christians, we are adopted as sons and daughters, becoming part of his heavenly family, and given an inheritance as co-heirs with Christ (Eph. 1:4-6; Rom. 8:17).
God can use our identities, however broken, to bring glory to himself and, through sanctification, make us more like Christ. This identity is secure as it is based on Christ’s atoning work on the cross – his resurrection and ascension – and not on what others think or what we think of ourselves. It came at a great cost to God for our good. One day, our whole selves will be perfected in glory. It is only in the gospel that we can find a great, unique and secure hope in all and any difficulties.
We need to take time to listen to the young people in our churches to truly understand what they are experiencing as each experience is going to be different. We also need to be intentionally working towards making sure the church is a deeper and better community than they can find elsewhere. We are not to affirm sin or make allowances for acting against God’s command, but we must be people who show others how loved and valued they are to us and ultimately to God, regardless of their struggles or past failings. Of course, prayer and spending time in God’s Word, personally and with our young people, is vital in supporting those thinking through identity issues.
There is a continuous stream of books and resources being produced on this very issue, but here are some helpful ones:
The Secular Creed: Engaging Five Contemporary Claims by Rebecca McLaughlin
Christ and the Culture Wars by Ben Chang
Five Lies of our Anti-Christian Age by Rosaria Butterfield
Finding Your Best Identity by Andrew Bunt
More to the Story by Jennifer Kvamme
