Identity

I’m now officially an ex-Chartered Accountant. Perhaps your view of bean counters (boring, excited by spreadsheets, etc.) is not that high, in which case my new status hardly warrants much attention or pity.

But the truth is I feel like something has gone. I worked hard for my qualification, and paid for it too. Up until recently, I benefited from a low-income subscription which made sense of keeping the connection, but this year I crossed the threshold and they sent me a bill for hundreds of pounds.

So I relinquished my hard-earned status. The truth is that I had not thought that much of this change until I had a letter from the Institute telling me, in no uncertain terms, that I was no longer permitted to call myself a Chartered Accountant or use the letters FCA after my name. The force of this stern letter was muted somewhat by the fact that it was addressed to Adrian Reynolds FCA, but notwithstanding this oversight, the point was clear.

I’m now officially an ex-Chartered Accountant. My status has irrevocably changed and with it – at least as it feels to me – part of my identity has gone too, given that this was such a formative part of my working career.

Changing statuses

The reality is that our statuses are changing all the time. I’ve just crossed the threshold from being in my 40s to living in my sixth decade. I’ve just become a grandfather for the first time. And so on. You also will be going through constant transitions, some of them positive experiences, some not so.

Perhaps all our UK readers will (at the time of writing) no longer be part of the EU on 29th March. Maybe. I’m no prophet. You may have changed your job recently. You may have got married. Perhaps other changes are unwelcome or unlooked for: health, bereavement and so on. Those kinds of challenges come our way all the time.

All of these situations contribute to our overall sense of identity. It would be very odd if they did not. Not all are positive, of course, but if – for example – we live with a long-term illness as many do, it will inevitably shape who we are and how we think of ourselves. Being a Christian does not mini-

mise these realities but it does something else – it places them in a context. We are not, ultimately defined by what we are, our experiences, backgrounds, health, age, race, culture, or even qualifications (or in my case from now on, lack of them), but who we are. All of these God grants us and uses to shape us, but always as part of a bigger picture: my identity, and yours, is as a believer – one who is in Christ.

One with him

That little phrase – in Christ – is one of Paul’s favourites. It is extraordinarily profound. In just two words are captured the essence of being a Christian: joined to Christ Jesus our Saviour. Not simply his followers, brothers, admirers, or servants (though not less than any of those), but one with him.

I’ve just been reading through that marvellous first section of Ephesians. Verses 3 to 14 of Chapter 1 are one long sentence in Greek. Paul almost gets carried away with the blessings that we have in Christ. It is remarkable how much the little phrase or variations of it recur: we are chosen in him; we are adopted to sonship through him; grace is given in him; in him we have redemption; we are included together in him; we are sealed in him.

Permanent identity

Each of these remarkable blessings is eternal. Our identity in Christ is unshakeable, unchangeable and won for us by Christ, applied to us by the Spirit and for the glory of the Father, secure forever. A very young hymn-writer, Charitie Lee Bancroft, wrote these now-famous words that C.H. Spurgeon first included in his hymnbook in 1866: ‘My name is written on his hands, my name is hidden in his heart; I know that while in heaven he stands no power can force me to depart.’

I may now officially be an ex-Chartered Accountant. But I will never be an ex-Christian because of the keeping, eternal work of Christ: in him, now and forever. And that matters more than anything. That is who I am.