Do You Know Who You Are?

John 1: 29-34

The next day he saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, ‘Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, “After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.” I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.’ And John testified, ‘I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.” And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.’

In the last reflection I was pointing out how the accounts of Jesus’ own birth, baptism and confirmation are also accounts of the true beginning and continuation of your personal spiritual story. I am now deliberately using the pronoun ‘you’ instead of ‘we or us’ because unless you truly personalize this event it will remain a frozen theological vignette. It is critical right now as you read this reflection that you don’t visualize the baptism of Jesus and the descent of the Holy Spirit on him as an event that is separated from you by a couple of thousand years or by the idea that because Jesus was the son of God, his experiences are far removed from your realm of existence. Try not to think of the Gospels as stories that happened a long time ago in a land far away. The sacrament of Baptism makes Christ as intimately and constantly present in the baptismal water and the oil as he is in the Eucharist. God does not deal with time lines like you and I do and even your own baptism is not just an event that took place X number of years ago. Every moment of every day Jesus is being plunged with you into the waters of your baptism and the Holy Spirit is descending like a dove upon you, anointing you with the power to become who you really are.

There is no space between what you read in the Gospels and who you are called to be right now. There is no space between you and Jesus as he rises out of the waters to hear the voice of God expressing his everlasting love as the Holy Spirit descends on his son and upon you. As with all sacraments, baptism and confirmation are sacraments of deep intimacy between you and Jesus. Every moment of every day you would be speaking the full truth if you were to say, “I am being baptized in a deluge of Holy Waters and I am being anointed by the Spirit of God right this moment. I am truly God’s Beloved. Here I am, Lord. I come to do your will.”

Ministerial priests are God’s anointed. You respect that anointing and you also have clear ideas in your head of how that anointing should define everything a priest does. You totally expect a priest’s life to be lived in accordance with his anointing. You, along with most of the world, take it for granted that a priest is anointed to serve with authority and to bring Christ to people in a special way. When it comes to the sacraments, it is totally true that a ministerial priest is anointed in a way that you are not. But your expectations of the role of a priest go beyond the sacraments, do they not?  I’ve said it before in a few of my reflections: we expect much of our ministerial priests but we all tend to let ourselves slide off the hook when it comes to discerning what our personal anointing means and how it defines each of us. It’s easy to forget that your anointing is no less solemn and powerful than that of a ministerial priest. Just as a priest’s anointing defines who he is and how he should respond to those he interacts with, your anointing also defines you. Within your baptism, you can discover your true identity. Everyone is desperate to know who they really are but the world and the Church are equally as desperate for the active presence of people who have discovered who they really are.

Honestly, do you see yourself as a person who walks daily in the powerful anointing of God? Do you stop and ponder your own priesthood and what it means? Do you continually ask the Lord, “What have you anointed me to do? Here I am. I want to do your will. What is it? Who am I?” If you seriously ask those questions with desire and a real belief in your own anointed priesthood, he will seriously answer you. The answer will be meant for you and you alone and the answer will astound you. God does nothing small or inconsequential. We are the ones who think of ourselves in small and inconsequential terms, not God.

You actually have a choice as to whether you are going to exist in a small, confined Christian walk or whether you are going to walk wide and large, side by side with Christ, touching when you see him touching, speaking when you hear him speaking, listening with respect and compassion when you observe him listening with respect and compassion. The anointing on you is a call to walk with Jesus in a way that allows you to echo what he said about his relationship with his God, “I do nothing except I see the Father in heaven do it first.” Now that is an intimate relationship! And this is what you are called to: To do nothing except you see Christ doing it first. That means more than just knowing the Gospel stories. It means seeking Christ every moment of the day. It means having an intimate relationship.

For that kind of a walk and that kind of relationship, you must believe in your anointing and endeavor to live within that anointing every moment of every day. Without the belief in who you really are it is not possible to walk with Jesus in such intimacy. He will always love you, bless you and be completely available to you but without the conviction of your anointing, you will always feel self-conscious about your position in the kingdom and be a little anxious that you might start ‘thinking too highly of yourself’.  Go back to Jesus and see how it really is to really walk as the Beloved of God. He knew who he was and he didn’t need anyone else to affirm his position or his ministry but ‘full of himself’ was the last thing he was. What he was full of was the voice of his Father saying, “You are my Beloved in whom I delight. I am so pleased with you. You are beautiful.” That’s why he was so attractive to others. That’s why the people said, “He speaks with authority and not as the scribes.”  He spoke and acted with the authority of one who knows he is loved and was called to transmit that love without stint. This is exactly what you are called to. This is your anointing.  

 Will you fail sometimes? Naturally. Will you often choose not to walk as an anointed one? If you’re human, you will find yourself making that choice more often than you wish. But the more you choose it and the more you consciously believe in it and seek it, the less you will want to live without it.
 

Carlos Carretto, a Little Brother of Charles De Foucald, once wrote that if we are having trouble believing the truth about ourselves or about God, then we should simply “act as if…”.  Act as if you are the Beloved. Act as if you are a dignified daughter or son of God. Act as if you have been given the authority to dispense mercy and compassion like oil on wounded hearts. Act like a pastor. Act as if Isaiah 61: 1-3 was written about you and repeat it to yourself daily:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. He has anointed me and sent me to bring good news to the poor, to heal the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom to those imprisoned within themselves and to proclaim a time of favor from the Lord, to comfort all those who mourn and to give them for ashes, a garland, for mourning robe, the oil of gladness and for despondency, praise.”

Act as if you are anointed from on high. It will show you exactly who you are.