TRUE Identity

Matt Miles • July 15, 2020

In the 2020 theme of FOCUSED we have looked at our TRUE Origin and Purpose. For the next several months we are going to FOCUS on our TRUE Identity. Who are we? How do we view ourselves? This topic affects everything around us, from relationships to how or what we worship.

There is an idea out there, maybe you have heard it, that says people are good. This idea often includes a belief that it is our environment that is evil and we are just trying to survive. Any bad in people comes from this struggle and our environment’s (or society’s) influences on us. This is, as you have already guessed, very evolutionary. A worldview like this leads to the question, “How does a loving God allow horrible things to happen to good people?” This idea does not take into account our Biblical identity.

The Bible is very clear that we are not good (Rom. 3:12). Our desire is to be good, but our sinful nature says otherwise. When Adam and Eve were first created on the sixth day in history, that was the last time people were labeled “good” by the Lord. In the perfection of creation, our human identity was His image. With that perfect image came perfect union with our Creator, until we sinned and lost that “good” standing in and with the creation and our Creator.

To this day we try and fix that standing and our identity by seeking and doing good. Yet our attempts, as great as they are at times, always fall short of His standard. By His grace alone we have a Savior, whose image we bear, who takes our sin and gives us our true identity. Our identity can only be found in the face of our Creator and Savior Jesus Christ. When we come to the realization that He is the only One truly “good”, then we have a standard and moral compass. Without understanding our identity is found in Jesus alone, we go through life with a false sense of identity that is easily swayed by other great sounding worldviews. Our TRUE identity is only found in His grace, mercy, holiness, righteousness and goodness.

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NS-29 Launch
By Matt Miles May 22, 2025
As many of you may know, I appreciate space. Not space around me, although the older I get the more I appreciate that as well. The things in the heavens fascinate me and have for a large chunk of my life. I love working with our telescopes, allowing people to see for themselves objects that the Lord made on the 4th day of history. When I was younger I followed our Space Shuttle program, and over the years I have had the opportunity to see a couple of those shuttles around the country. Now it is great to see all the renewed interest in exploring the heavenly creation. I know most of it is for evolutionary reasons, yet over and over again something is discovered that points to the trustworthiness of God’s Word. After all, we are to study His creation as Genesis 1:28 states. On a recent trip to El Paso, it occurred to me that Blue Origin’s launch facility is in west Texas somewhere. After some quick searching I realized we were within an hour and half of it, and there was a rescheduled launch window during the time of our meeting. So, with some persuading of my colleagues, we arose early one morning to make the launch. We made it with just minutes to spare. It was spectacular! The whole launch to just beyond the Karman Line (space boundary, 62 miles/100km) and return of the rocket and capsule is about ten minutes total. While Blue Origin is best known for its New Shepherd rocket that carries paying customers to space and back with the biggest windows ever in a capsule, this NS-29 launch was purely experimental with a payload of instruments to measure simulated lunar gravity. Even though it was not a Saturn V, Space Shuttle, Starship or Falcon launch, it was great to hear and feel a launch for the first time, from blast off to the sonic boom return. It has piqued my desire to see a bigger launch now. As I began to reflect on what I experienced, the Lord reminded me of His design. Earth, our home planet, is so well designed for life. There is literally nowhere in all the universe like it. Yet He gave us the ability to discover creation beyond it. The only reason we can launch rockets and do space exploration is because He set it up in an orderly way. Physics works because He established it to work in a predictable fashion. As much as we may never understand everything in the universe from our position here, it works on an ordered reality that is reinforced by God’s Word. This is what drove Sir Isaac Newton in his understanding of physics. He wrote, “The motions which the planets now have could not spring from any natural cause alone but were by an intelligent Agent.” Evolutionists may come up with theories about the origin of things in the heavens, but over and over again they are being shown through experimentation and observation to be wrong. The Lord set the order of everything in the beginning and sustains it by His Word (Hebrews 1:3). So as you look to the heavens tonight, gaze into the depths of space and observe the different facets the Lord placed up there for our eyes (Genesis 1:17). Peer through a telescope at the lesser light of the moon with marvel and anticipation of further human study in the coming years. Check out the amazing observations being made by the James Webb telescope from deep in space. All of these place a perspective of how awesome our Creator is and how much we depend on Him. Our design becomes more and more obvious with every discovery, yet in our universe we appear so minuscule and fragile. Thanks be to God that His infinite focus has, is and always will be here on us! Blessings.
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