Identity is the defining issue in our cultural moment. In light of the thick fog that envelops the debate over identity, Christians must speak “true truth,” as Francis Schaeffer put it, in a winsome, loving way.

Identity matters personally and socially. Identity is important personally. You search for identity when you ask “Who am I?” You experience it when you are conscious of yourself and of other selves who are different, when you identify yourself with a cause or circle of friends, and when you construct an identity on social media. The significance of identity is felt in your intuitive valuing of yourself, in the strong desire to mean something, an enduring longing to count, wanting people to care for you and respect you, and in the hurt that arises when people don’t notice or aren’t interested in you. Longing for a secure identity is universal. You long to belong and to be loved. You feel anger when your identity is attacked, shame when your fragility is exposed, and loneliness when you feel left out. Identity matters personally.

Identity is also important at a social level. We are social beings who know ourselves in relationship to others, by identifying with those who are like us and differentiating from those who are unlike. We often group ourselves by gender, ethnic, sexual, economic, cultural or religious identities and exclude others. Today cultural and sexual identities are more celebrated than ever and, at the same time, more fluid. Identity markers that were once viewed as firm and fixed, like gender, are now seen as changeable based on a person’s self-identification. Ideological and political battles are fought over identity with neither conservatives nor progressives giving an inch. Moreover, many people find their deepest sense of identity in religion, in allegiance to God. Identity matters socially, to both secular and spiritual people.

Identity is entangled in what is most beautiful about us as well as what is most broken within us. No theory seeking to explain the human condition with all its glorious achievements, noble deeds and cultural advances as well as all of its evil, violence, oppressions, exclusions, wars and animosities can leave out the central role identity plays. As a pastor, I engage with the Christian Scriptures on a regular basis, and I think they bring a unique contribution to the subject of identity.  From Jason Dorsey’s, The Name.