What kind of person do you want to be? This week, we held our first confirmation class ahead of our confirmation service on Sunday 10th May. As part of this week’s class, we discussed who we are and the identities we have in life, both chosen and imposed. Confirmation is a time when we choose an identity, when we choose to stand up and say that we follow Jesus.

This week, I have been re-reading the biography of my spiritual hero, the pastor and writer Eugene Peterson. In his personal reflections on ministry, he considers the kind of pastor and minister he wants to be. This has got me thinking about the kind of minister I want to be. I want to be a minister who prays, a priest who slows down to see and recognise God’s presence in our community, and a priest who pursues being like Jesus as the most important quality for my life. These things don’t happen by accident. They must be chosen, not just once, but each day of our Christian walk. I know that I will get it wrong and fall short, but I hope and pray that, by his grace, in my attempts to live like Jesus I will become more of the person he is calling me to be. 

Who is God calling you to be? Who has he made you to be? I pray that each day you may know who God has made you to be, and that you may be able to live it more and more each day. If you are a writer, then write. If you are a planner, then plan and organise. If you are a singer, then sing. If you are a teacher, then teach. Whoever God has made you to be, I hope that you are able to live that out every day. Maybe not perfectly, but by God’s grace, we live that fully with him.