by Boni Piper

Dear Beloved,

This blog is called, “Being the Beloved” because that is who we are, even though we so seldom live in that place. It’s hard to reconcile the “dirty rotten sinner”(as a friend of mine calls herself) with “the Beloved.” Yet isn’t that the very thing Jesus turned on it’s head? His death and resurrection let the sinner become the Beloved. These two themes are constant in scripture and the church. I learned about the “dirty rotten sinner” way before I learned about being the Beloved. Sinner is the obvious one. I see my sin. I do the things I don’t want to do. I turn from God more than I like to admit. And in that very place of sinning, God’s Spirit touched me and redeemed me and gave me a new name…Beloved.

I think it pains God when I forget that and when I choose to live in the “sinner” lie rather than the beloved truth. Where I make my home changes everything. It is my identity, the spirit that comes from me, the way I treat others and myself, and defines who God is to me and who I am to God. That God the Father sees me through the eyes of Jesus and what he has done demands that I see myself as his Beloved. The love child. The one he loves to spend time with. The one he woos and calls and equips. Shame has no place in the life of the Beloved for God looks upon her/him with love, and smiles!

Being the Beloved means believing in what God has done and said about you. How much of believing you are the Beloved forms your identity? How does claiming the name Beloved help you identify with your true self? What would be different in your life, if being the Beloved was something you believed with all your heart?

That’s what this blog is about. We want to encourage each other in this God given identity of being the Beloved. Knowing that makes us different, but different how? We want to be more about being than doing, but we don’t want to “be” just anything. We want to act, feel and demonstrate that our being defines us, and that being is, the Beloved. It should mean everything to us. It should form our identity, decisions and actions.

It is our hope that this blog would help you in forming your identity, in your discernment and in your actions. Please feel free to dialogue so we can join our wisdom together on this crucial part of being Christian.