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You can be seated. Thank you, team. Who's grateful for a creative team that serve us so brilliantly? It is always special that we can come and lift up our praise and worship and we are led so brilliantly. The mirror is back on stage. If you were around last month, we spent a bit of time talking about the mirror. And we talked about how we are made in the image of God. The God who revealed himself at creation as relational, creative, and generous. We were made in his image. But at the fall, in that story that you find in Genesis chapter 2 and 3, where humanity rebels in pride and disobedience is what we Christians would use the word sin. And what that did is it distorted the image we were created in. And now, although we can love like the image we were created in, we have a tendency to be selfish. And though we can be generous, we see a world full of greed. And although we can be creative, perhaps not all of us the same level of creativity, like Kayla was talking about before, but we also have this capability to be destructive. And we see that in its extremes when war and violence happen in the world around us. But from that time at the fall, God set about his plan to redeem humanity. And that is to restore the image that we were created in. And we talked about how we are in Christ. We receive this new identity that isn't about ourselves, but is the Christ who came for us. We can stop drawing our identity from the horizontal things of this world, like relationships, like objects, like achievements. And we draw our identity from the vertical relationship we were created for. We take our identity from the Creator, not from the things of creation. So in Christ, we don't need things of this world to validate us or to earn a place for us. We are chosen, accepted, and loved. We can stop striving and we can stop looking for status symbols because in Christ we receive our place. In Christ, we aren't our failures or successes. We aren't our shortcomings or insecurities. We aren't the wrongs that we've done or the wrongs that have been done to us. In Christ, we receive restoration and wholeness. And that is what it is, that journey of following Jesus is to relearn, to have that redemption of our identity and become all that we were created to be. And with that in mind, we arrive at our verse for today. James chapter 1, verse 23 to 25, or 22, sorry, uh to 25. I'll be reading from the New Living Translation. It says this, but be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror. For he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does. James is saying that if I was to look in the mirror and then suddenly step away and begin to think that I have a bodybuilder's physique and long flowing hair, that I have lost track of who I am, that the identity that I think of myself is different from the reality that I see. Have you ever heard of foreign accent syndrome? If you go and put that into Google or YouTube, uh you will come across a series of bizarre stories. Uh, stories like an English woman who developed a strong Chinese accent after a series of headaches, an Australian woman who developed an Eastern European accent after some new medication, an American who developed an Irish accent suddenly after having dental surgery. Can you imagine if I came in next week and all of a sudden I sounded like a Texas cowboy? Or I came in sounding like a French artiste and I was speaking like this. If you've seen the clips online or on the TV, you might get a bit of a chuckle at how strange it seems when this English woman is talking like she has a Chinese accent. But can you imagine for those rare cases how it must feel when the voice coming out of your mouth doesn't reflect your experience of life, doesn't sound like your voice. And foreign accent syndrome might be very rare and extreme and so strange that you know they end up on 60 minutes as a human interest story. But I think everyone at some point has experienced this identity clash at some stage of their life. Identities can be these fragile things. Like perhaps you've had a business failure or a season of unemployment, and it doesn't just impact you financially, it begins to impact how you see yourself. Perhaps it feels like everything is in order in life, and then all of a sudden there's some sort of relationship challenge, and and life just seems to unravel. And it's not just your emotional well-being that is impacted, it's like the very core of how you see yourself is challenged. I've found that in the moments of greatest pressure, of greatest challenge, we tend to see our true selves revealed. It's in the challenge where we see what we really look like. Have you ever had those moments where you walk away from a situation thinking, like, where did that come from? Like the kids have been, and this is applicable to parents because you will understand this one. The kids have been picking at you, picking at you, and all of a sudden you burst out and you're like, whoa, I didn't realize I was so angry. I didn't realize that was in me. And we can chuckle about that, but we've had those moments in life where perhaps our actions don't reflect how we see ourselves. Like we look in the mirror and we see the identity of God and we know all the things that we're supposed to be, and then we step away, and all of a sudden our behavior and our actions and how we even perceive ourselves is very different. Christians find this tension exists. The old self and the new creation. Paul refers to it, sounds like the kids are having a good time out there. Paul refers to it in the New Testament as the life I now live. And last month we looked at what it means to be a Jesus follower, that it's not just coming and getting a new list of do's and don'ts, and it's more than just a set of theological beliefs, but that in following Jesus we receive that grace gift of a new identity in Christ. Everything that Christ is, and everything that Christ has done is imparted unto us. To follow Christ is to learn this new way of not just seeing the world around us, but to relearn how we see ourselves. This is what redemption looks like relearning our identity as being created in God's image. But what happens when, like James writes, we get a glimpse and we walk away and forget what we looked like in the mirror? So today I want to talk to you from the topic of identity clash. Identity clash. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we come to your word and we pray that it reveals something in us that draws us closer to you. There's something of you is formed within us, and we can step into all that you have for us. Uh, bless every open heart today to receive. In Jesus' name. Amen. Uh, as we looked at these passages last month, we were uh going through Ephesians. But who would like some Old Testament stories? Who thinks we should get some Old Testament stories? You know, the Old Testament, uh, for those of you unfamiliar with the Bible, is the first part of the Bible. It's the Hebrew Bible. Uh and it starts with God creating the world in Genesis chapter one, and then it follows this long and winding story of how God draws humanity back to himself, uh, and particularly focusing on the nation of Israel. And along the way, some of the stories pry out like a bit of a Hollywood blockbuster. Like there are some big moments that take place in the Old Testament. And when James, in in the New Testament, after Jesus, he has, he writes, if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he isn't just referring to the Bible as a checklist of behaviors. James understands what the writer of Hebrews says in Hebrews 4, verse 12, for the word of God is living and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword. The word of God pierces to soul and spirit, to joint and marrow. It's a discerner of the thoughts and the intents of the heart. So perhaps you've never read the Old Testament, or perhaps you don't know all the different stories, but understand that these stories are for us to wrestle with because they're more than just stories. They cut to the deep things of our heart. And if you grew up in church and went to kids' church, like my children are right now, on a regular basis, you probably would have heard the story of Jonah, the man who God swallowed with a fish. We won't get too drawn into the story, but let's say uh this Bible story certainly isn't about do's and don'ts. It's talking about something deeper. It's talking about a deep character story, about a conflicted and challenged prophet and a good and gracious God. And there's this passage in the book of Jonah where Jonah provides an insight into how he views himself. Jonah 1, verse 9 says, So he, Jonah, said to them, I am a Hebrew, and I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land. We're in verse 9, and we've barely started the first page, and we get a picture of how Jonah sees himself. When Jonah looks in the mirror, he sees his cultural identity. He says, I am a Hebrew. By today's language, he might say, I have perfect church attendance. I go to the conferences, I say a prayer before my meals, I even send my kids to Christian schools, and all those things are good. And I don't want to lose my job by saying those things don't matter. But that was intended to be a joke. But in this moment, we'll see his cultural identity clashes with reality. When Jonah looks in the mirror, he sees his theological identity. He says, I fear the Lord. He's the God of heaven who made the earth. Jonah says all the right stuff about God. He's got an intellectual understanding of who God is and our relationship with him. So Jonah has this cultural connection, he has this intellectual connection. But the reality is that Jonah is a man who, when he steps away from the mirror, he forgets who he is. Jonah's view of himself is one thing, but this is how the book of Jonah starts. Jonah 1, verse 1 says, Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah, saying, Arise, go to Nineveh, the great city, and cry out against it, for their wickedness has come up before me. But Jonah arose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the Lord. He went down to Joppa, found a ship going to Tarshish, paid the fare, and went down into it to go with them to Tarshish to get away from the presence of the Lord. Jonah receives a word from God. This is Jonah whose identity is a Hebrew. Jonah whose identity is one who fears God. And in verse 1 and 2, he gets a word from God. And in verse 3, he does the opposite. His actions don't line up with how he sees himself. Jonah has a case of foreign accent syndrome. What's going on on the outside doesn't match the picture. He thinks one way, but he acts another. He steps away from the mirror and completely forgets who he is. We spoke the other week about the process of formation, how identity shapes our purpose and our purpose shapes our actions. And as we align these things, it reinforces our identity. And this cycle of identity, purpose, and behavior keeps reinforcing itself, and that's the process of formation. That's the process by which we become more and more like Jesus. We experience the identity we received in Christ. But Jonah doesn't experience this, he experiences living inside the whale. He is a hearer of the word, he hears from God, but he's not a doer. Even worse, when he begrudgingly does what he was told to do, he was bitter and upset about it. I have a little four-year-old and he likes the story of Jonah. He thinks it's a funny story. But when he's old enough to understand how this story plays out, he might see that Jonah isn't the hero of this story. That Jonah is upset when God shows mercy to Nineveh. The book of Jonah, in fact, doesn't even have a resolution. The book of Jonah finishes with a question. Full context, if you're new to the story, Jonah is spat out by the fish. He goes to Nineveh, and the people of Nineveh repent and turn to God. And Jonah, the prophet who fears God, is upset about it. Jonah would have much preferred God just destroy the city and get rid of the Ninevites. And Jonah goes out of the city to be sad and upset because God showed grace to Nineveh. Jonah gets a bit hot and he sits down, and God causes a plant to spring up and give him shade. So he's a bit less upset. And then the plant dies, and now Jonah is upset again. And this is how the book of Jonah finishes. Then the Lord said, You feel sorry about the plant. Though you did nothing to put it there, it came up quickly and died quickly. But Nineveh has more than 120,000 people living in spiritual darkness, not to mention all the animals. Shouldn't I feel sorry for such a great city? That is how the book of Jonah ends. Jonah has a disconnect. Because he might have this identity as a God follower, but he doesn't seem to have any understanding of who God really is. He looks in the mirror and it's surface level. He doesn't truly know God, and he certainly hasn't let God shape him in who he is. The God of mercy and love is not the person Jonah is. Jonah's the prophet. Jonah's the Hebrew. Jonah fears God, but he has an identity clash. And all the outside labels don't reflect the internal condition of Jonah's heart. Old Testament stories, they're pretty fun, right? There's this grappling that comes with. They don't always just have this neat ending or this simple, you know, moral uh learning that you can take away. Do you want another Old Testament story? Let's look at Abraham. Uh we find Abraham pop up in Genesis chapter 11, and we don't know much about him when he arrives on the scene. He's a bit of a farmer, he has livestock, and we know his wife Sarah can't have babies. Abraham has demonstrated no remarkable qualities, yet he receives a blessing from God. He's chosen to be part of that redemption story we talked about, that God is working through the Old Testament. And a bit like Jonah, Abraham is dysfunctional and quite frankly, sometimes immoral when you read the stories of some of the things he does. Yet time and time again, he encounters God and God's blessing is reinforced. And Abraham, who has this promise from God to become a great nation, but has a wife who is barren, experiences a great miracle. They get pregnant. And at the age of 100, Abraham and Sarah have their baby of promise. They have Isaac, their son. Abraham, who sometimes showed faith but often made a mess of situations, who kept experiencing God and blessing, gets the promise he so desired. And with that background, we arrive at Genesis chapter 22. Says this sometime later, that's after the birth of Isaac, God tested Abraham's faith. Abraham, God called. Yes, he replied, here I am. Take your son, your only son, yes, Isaac, whom you love so much, and go to the land of Moriah, go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you. If you're unfamiliar with the story, and even if you are familiar with the story, this is a plot twist that kind of throws the whole thing sideways. This is the same moment that Jonah had. Except in the preface of this verse, it describes it for what it is. It says, God tested Abraham's faith. It was a test of faith. Is what you see in the mirror, the reality that you live in when you step away? Faith is the substance that holds when we step away from the mirror. Does the word of God still hold its place when you're not there in the midst of it? Jonah said his identity was a God-fearing Hebrew, but his life resembled something else. The Bible says that Abraham had faith in God and it was counted to him as righteousness. In this passage, we see that that faith is, we'll in this passage we'll see if that faith is external or something deeper. I mentioned earlier about the situations we find ourselves in, those challenges in life, where we find what our identity is really made of. Those pressure moments that reveal what's inside of us. Abraham had started responding to God. He'd shown obedience here and there. He kept moving towards the blessing. Now God was calling him to lay down the very blessing he'd been moving towards. And if you know the story, Isaac seemingly willingly cooperates. We know he's old enough and big enough to carry the wood for the altar. So father and son climb the mountain. And most Bible commentators believe that uh Isaac by this stage is a teenage boy, and he allows his elderly father to tie him up. The story plays out in just a short few verses, and it doesn't go into too much detail, but we can use a bit of creative imagination to consider the intensity of this moment. I can see trembling hands as Abraham took the knife, ready to sacrifice, heavy breathing and pulses racing the intensity of the moment. Were they stoic? Were they weeping? A father who deeply loved his son, preparing to obey an instruction. He didn't understand. He couldn't grasp why this was taking place. But God, just like with Jonah, showed himself full of mercy. And in verse 10 it says, Abraham picked up the knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. At that moment the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, Abraham, Abraham. Yes, Abraham replied, Here I am. Don't lay a hand on the boy. The angel said, Do not hurt him in any way, for I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld from me even your son, your only son. Then Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in the thicket. So he took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering in the place of his son. Abraham named the place Yahweh Yirah, which means the Lord will provide. Other translations use the term Jehovah Jirah, which perhaps you've heard. Abraham, who was far from perfect, but his identity was in his vertical relationship to God, not the horizontal relationships of this world. Abraham's identity wasn't ultimately anchored in the blessing God had given him, it was anchored in the God who gave him the blessing. Abraham put the blessing giver above the blessing he'd received. So, what do we learn from these two stories? How do we become people who don't just receive an identity but live it out? How do we navigate life, which is certain to bring challenge and trial? And if we went through this room, all of us can share moments where life didn't make sense, where life seemed to throw a curveball at us. And how do we come through those moments with our identity intact? How do we look in the mirror and see all that Christ has for us and then go into life and still have the identity match what we saw in the mirror? How do we overcome identity clash? Let's go back and look at James. And point number one when it comes to dealing with identity clash, it's understanding that faith comes from the word. Number one, faith comes from the word. Hebrews 11 tells us that the story of Abraham was not one of character or willpower. Abraham's story is one of faith. When we read the story of Abraham, we might be confused by all his flaws and failings, but we can't deny his faith. God spoke and Abraham believed. Abraham had faith because God had spoken the promise. When Abraham received the word from God, offer Isaac as a sacrifice, he obeyed. How? Because he had faith in who God was, not just what God said. And there's a distinction there. His faith was in the one who blesses, not the blessing he provides. When Abraham declared Jehovah Jirah, was it that God had provided the ram, or was it that God had already provided the son? He had already blessed him with Isaac. Abraham knew God was a provider long before the ram showed up in the bushes. He obeyed God because he already knew God was a provider. For you and I, where does faith come from? God revealed his word to us in Jesus. Romans 10 verse 17 says, Faith comes from hearing. That is hearing the good news about Christ. If you've read uh the New King James Version, it often says, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. But the word of God there, it actually talks about Christos. It's talking about the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ. The message of Jesus, it produces faith in us. John's gospel said that the word became flesh and dwelt among us. That is Jesus. Eugene Peterson in the message translation says, the word moved into the neighborhood. The word is a person, and the word is Jesus. When you pick up the word of God, when you look into the mirror, like James says, you're not looking for a checklist. You're not looking for a rule book. You're looking for the person of Jesus Christ. Being a doer is not to distill the word of God into do's and don'ts. It's to look in the mirror and become like the person of Jesus. We don't just hear the word. We are drawn to experience what James calls the freedom, the law of liberty. Because the word isn't simply telling us what to do, the word is revealing Jesus to us. And Jesus said, Whom the Son sets free is free indeed. You want to be a doer? You've got to let the mirror keep shaping you into the person you're seeing. So the more time you spend looking into the mirror, into the gospel of Jesus Christ, the more the gospel begins to transform and change who you are. The word of God becomes a place where you pursue Jesus and Jesus is formed in you. The more we see Jesus in the mirror, the more faith builds within us. So firstly, faith comes from the Word. Faith comes through Jesus. And secondly, faith leads to formation. So as faith is formed within us through the Word, faith leads to formation. Earlier in that book of James, the first few verses, it says this Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. I don't know too many people who put trials and troubles as great joy. Because it says this, for you know that when faith is tested, just like it was ta Abraham's faith was tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be comp perfect and complete, needing nothing. It's talking about how faith produces endurance, and endurance produces maturity. For James, faith under fire produces strength, it produces formation. For Abraham, God tested his faith. And Abraham, believing in the provider, received confirmation of the blessing. There on the mountain, and we won't read the full passage, but in Genesis 22, verse 16 to 18, having passed the faith test, having had that moment where he put his faith in the provider, not in his provision, we see God reaffirm his blessing. He says things like, I will certainly bless you, I will multiply your descendants like the stars in the sky, and through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed. We are living in the blessing of his faith, because he put faith in God, we now receive an inheritance. Abraham shows faith, and God pours out blessing. James said it that way. Not just a blessing as far as a prosperity, but a blessing in a wholeness, in your character, in your internal things. The blessing comes. The greatest blessing we can experience isn't the things around us, it's Jesus. If faith comes from the Word and Jesus is the Word, the test becomes an opportunity to experience Him. Trials, the trials that you've gone through, they're an opportunity, an invitation to experience Jesus. And an identity clash happens when in the midst of a trial we take our eyes off him. Trials have a way of revealing what we're holding on to. For Abraham, Abraham was holding on to Jehovah Jirah, not to Isaac. When we start losing control, when you have those moments where you feel like the world is falling apart, we try and grab on to all the things around us. We try and hold on to them, like we can keep control of what's going on around us because we've put our identity in them. But in the midst of the trial, we hold on to him, we hold on to Jesus. Then faith produces endurance, and endurance produces completion. In the middle of your mayhem, don't lose hold of him. If you've stepped away from the mirror and all the world is raging, don't forget the one who's with you in the storm. Hebrews 11, verse 1 says, faith shows the reality of what we hope for. It's the evidence of the things we cannot see. Faith becomes the gap from when we're looking in the mirror to when we step away. Faith is the thing that holds us in our identity in Him. There's somebody here. And what you need to know is your identity is in Christ. You can't let go of him in the midst of the storm. Keep holding on to Jesus. And I know there's storms and I know there's trials breaking out in lives in this room, but keep holding on to him. I don't know how your test ends, but I know the one you'll become like. Take the world, but give me Jesus. Point number three is this, and that is faith is provided. Faith is provided. In the rest of the letter of James, if we flick over from James 1 through the rest of the book, James goes out of his way to point out that no one can fulfill religion. That in all the areas that James identifies that we should be doers, we all fall short. Dan Doriani, in his commentary on the book of James, puts it like this This is the gospel according to James. No one consistently demonstrates true religion. Therefore, the Father who gives good gifts gives the supreme gift, saving grace to the humble. And I'll invite the band to come. The reality of James's view about looking in the mirror is that we all have identity clash at some stage. But the only one who didn't have identity clash was Jesus. Consider Abraham. Abraham seemingly could only fully participate. Sorry, only could only fulfill the test because Isaac seemed a willing participant. If he objected, if he said, no way, I'm not carrying the wood up that mountain, are you crazy? I know what you're up to. What's going on here? More more uh obviously, he allowed his frail, we don't know his frail, he allows his much older father to tie him up. He submitted himself to the father. Does it sound familiar? Jesus submitted to the father. Isaiah 53, verse 7 puts it like this, speaking, prophesying of Jesus. He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth. You know, faith comes from Jesus, faith comes from the word. Faith leads to formation, but ultimately faith is provided to us through Jesus. Jesus is the source of our faith. And we can only have faith because Jesus participated in our experience. For the joy set before him, he went to the cross, and he went through the greatest trial, and he went through the greatest challenge, and his identity never clashed. So we put our identity in him. The one who is unshaken, the one who never falters. How then do we live lives where the identity we've received becomes the identity we experience? How do we avoid identity clash? James isn't saying, look in the mirror and then go away and try harder. He isn't saying, look in the mirror, go away and just do better. I think the answer is that he's saying, look in the mirror and look and look again. Look in the mirror and keep reflecting on, keep setting your eyes on Jesus. Keep looking to the one who never faltered, keep looking to the one who never clashed in his identity. If your business fails, look again. If a relationship breaks down, look again. If you discover something of yourself that you don't quite like, which doesn't match up to the reality that you thought you were living in, look and look again. When you don't know what the future holds, when life seems full of uncertainty, look and look again. Whatever you might face, whenever you step away from the mirror, remember to keep coming back and looking to Him. Remember, your identity is in Christ, the faith that's formed from not just hearing but from knowing Jesus. The faith that forms us, the faith that holds us, holds our identity in the midst of test and trial. Would you stand across this room? One of the privileges of being a pastor is I often find people are open with the tests and the trials that they face. And you might be under the impression that you're the only one here that ever experiences those moments where perhaps your identity is tested. Perhaps you have those moments where you find yourself trying to hold on to things as the world falls apart. But there is one you can hold on to who's never shaken, who never fails, who never falters, who never clashes. He is the one and the true, he is Jesus. So perhaps with every eye closed and every head bowed, I want to pray for every person here. You're in the midst of a challenge. Holy Spirit, would you come to all those who are in the middle of a trial? That they would know the joy of the one who is with them. That their identity wouldn't be in the things around them, but their identity would be in you, Jesus. Cause faith to stir within them. That you are in control, that you are working all things in them. Jesus. But you're in Christ, and he is with you. And as you go this week, keep coming back to him. Keep looking into the law of liberty, the freedom of Christ.