Finding The Soul’s Identity: Thoughts on John 15

Soul: Finding Identity by W. Rian Adams

Lectionary Reading: John 15:9-17, Sixth Sunday After Easter, Year B.

Soul identity is confusing. It’s also often faked in light of a desired persona. Listen carefully to this week’s lectionary Gospel and you will hear a call to find the soul’s true identity in God. It is often the challenge of true spirituality to find the true self as rooted in the compassionate Christ. Jesus confronted this in the Pharisees and warned his disciples of the dangers of the false self.

The Gospel:

Jesus said to his disciples, “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”

Jung on Soul Identity

I am reminded of what the great Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung, once said about identity. He suggested that “we cannot change ourselves until we accept ourselves. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.” When there is a refusal to see ourselves (and others) through God’s eyes of compassion, we oppress our soul’s identity. Oppression has been a theological buzz word for a few decades. Normally we use it in conjunction to liberation theology and we apply it as a stance toward the poor. However, I wonder what happens when we apply the theological idea to a personal spirituality rooted in self-compassion…

After all, good spirituality finds its root in identity.

It’s easy to identify with personal belongings, or the desire to attain them. I’ve heard, and probably preached, many sermons that reminded people not to become possessed by possessions. Sure, that’s a great starting point. The problem is we’ve heard it so much that it no longer resonates.

I suggest a different approach. I think it is helpful to hear the words of Jesus, abide in me as I abide in God, in light of our identity in God. His words are a call to accept our relationship with the divine.

But it doesn’t stop there. We are not simply connected to God but we are identified with God.

The English Christian mystic,  Julian of Norwich, said “We are not simply from God, but we are part of God.” Julian knew that we are intimately intertwined with the divine. We know we are in and of God when the person of Christ comes out in action. Mercy and compassion were his hallmarks. The soul’s identity is the compassion of Christ. Not sacrifice, not condemnation, but mercy.

One of my favorite quotes is by John Sanford who said, “If we judge others, it is because we are judging something in ourselves of which we are unaware.” 

-Rian