What Do Others See as Your Identity?
Our Mission
To present Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord to business and professional men and to develop Christian business and professional men to carry out the Great Commission.
Matthew 22.39 records God answering the question about which command is most important. His answer is unbelievable: A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself. Most of us envision God as a bit of an egotist. He wants to be worshiped by everyone, all the time. That’s what we would want if we were God. While the One True God seeks worshipers, His first desire is to be loved.
However, the One True God defines love practically as loving our fellow human as we love our self. This is absolutely mind blowing and is absolutely unique to the One True God recorded in the Christian Bible. The muslims do not record their god as having the same ultimate desire. Their god too often condones killing, raping, lying and stealing. The hindus with their myriad of gods all have competing demands and petty arguments over which is the greatest. The buddhists seeks to ignore God all together but promise a way to heaven without Him (really?).
God measures our love for Him by our love for our fellow man. God does not separate love for Him from our love for each other. So that we wont be confused on what that love is to look like, He tells us to love others as we love our self. We know what that means. At least we know how we feel when we are loved. We know how we feel when we are unloved. We know what love looks like to us. God commands us to demonstrate that love by loving others and in this way we are loving Him. This is not complicated. This is not God being an egotist. This is not God asking too much of us or from us.
However, our obedience to this command determines how well we live with one another. The reason God doesn’t ‘fix’ the planet is because He doesn’t cause us to robotically obey Him which if we did, that would fix the planet. We have a voice. We have a choice. We have to choose God and thus choose love if we will see the planet fixed. God doesn’t ‘make’ us do anything. Most of us like it that way.
God’s commands feel like suggestions since there appears to be no consequence from Him for failure to obey. But we are reaping our sown behavior of disobedience to God. We are reaping our ignoring to love God. We are having so much trouble with our fellow man because we have not loved him as we love our self. We shouldn’t think there will be no consequence for our disobedience. God will call every person to account on that day we pass from this life to the next. Only those who loved Him in this life will enter into His presence to live forever. Everyone else will receive their wish, life without God forever. God describes this life as hell.
The world God promises in the future is filled with love. Those who live there already know what that will look like because they have begun practicing it now. There is only one God and His ways are good. There is only one humanity and we are not so good because we are failing to love God and consequently love one another.
His Opportunities
- Tomorrow, Tuesday, July 19th at the City Rescue Mission from noon until 1pm is your next CBMC Rescue Luncheon. This is your opportunity to serve lunch to the men and women who depend upon the Mission for their meal. Commit Here
August 11-12 at Trinity Church, is The Global Leadership Summit. This is a two-day event telecast LIVE in HD from Willow Creek Church near Chicago to hundreds of locations in North America. You are invited to join an expected 305,000 people committed to getting better as leaders in 2016. Register Here
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MONDAY MANNA
A service to the business community
A Publication of CBMC International
July 18, 2016
What Do Others See as Your Identity?
by Robert J. Tamasy
From time to time we hear of people taking a break from their jobs, college, even their marriages, to “search for their identity.” As if they might have misplaced it somewhere and are hoping it will turn up at a lost-and-found room somewhere. Such a quest might seem curious at best, foolish at worst. But in reality, our identity does mean a lot – especially in the business and professional world.
We see this in tangible ways with quickly recognizable corporate logos such as Nike, McDonald’s, Mercedes and Ford, Google, or the New York Yankees. Years ago I was in Jamaica and found it surprising to discover items in a shop representing one of the popular U.S. racecar drivers at the time. Establishing a recognizable image is crucial in the competitive local, national and global markets.
Carefully designed business cards help us to instantly convey who we are and what we do. After all, one of the first questions we often ask of people we have just met is, “What kind of work do you do?” In other words, “Who are you – what are you?”
When a company develops a unique product, legal steps are taken to secure a patent or trademark so competitors cannot duplicate it. Enterprises are becoming extremely protective of their brand, whether it be an international, multi-faceted corporation like the Walt Disney Company, a prominent university, a retailing franchise, or even a well-known public figure.
Bringing this closer to home, have you ever considered that, even if you do not own a business or head a company, you also have a “logo,” “trademark” and “brand” others use to evaluate who you are and what you stand for? Recently I read this statement: “Your smile is your logo, your personality is your business card, how you leave others feeling after an experience with you becomes your trademark.” And we might add, “Whether others aspire to be like you is your brand.” What do you think people you work with regard as your “brand” or “trademark”? Do they look forward to doing business with you on a personal level?
Although the Bible does not use the terms, it offers great insight into how to go about creating a highly marketable personal trademark or brand. Here are just three examples of its wisdom on this topic:
The power of being others-oriented. Society often urges us to “look out for No.1 (ourselves),” but people who put others first are rare and extraordinary. “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others” (Philippians 2:3-4).
The attraction of a generous spirit. There are many worthy causes to which we can give from our resources, but a sincerely generous, freely giving person can benefit others in many ways. “Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7).
The impact of showing compassion. What is the best way to treat people? Simply, treat them as you would want to be treated if the roles were reversed. “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you” (Matthew 7:12).
© 2016. Robert J. Tamasy is vice president of communications for Leaders Legacy, Inc., a non-profit based in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A. Bob has written Business At Its Best: Timeless Wisdom from Proverbs for Today’s Workplace; Tufting Legacies; and coauthored with David A. Stoddard, The Heart of Mentoring. His biweekly blog is: www.bobtamasy.blogspot.com.
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