As the restrictions around the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown begin to ease, there is a lot of talk about essential services. What would you class as essential services? And why? And a more pertinent question perhaps: what do you consider to be essential for your own life, for you to thrive and not just survive?
God is clear in Ephesians 2:10 about who you are:
You are His Masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus to do good works that He purposed in advance for you to do.
Who you are is more important than what you do. But living through several months of lockdown has brought into sharp focus what we do because much of it has been stripped away, albeit temporarily. This provides a startling coaching opportunity to engage with clients about their values and priorities and where their identity lies.
There has been so much catastrophic fallout from this pandemic and associated lockdown that has been about what we perceive from a human perspective are the essentials of life: health, finances, food.
But devastating too has been the impact on our very nature as human beings. Loneliness and isolation. Loss of identity through lost work or purpose. Lost celebrations. Key transitions and achievements passing without public ceremony. What do these losses speak to in your own life, and in what your clients might be wanting to address?
This is a great opportunity to ask ourselves and our clients: what have you missed of life pre-lockdown? What was important to you about that? What have you NOT missed and why? When you consider what you have missed and lost, what is God showing you about where your identity and security lie? Are our identity and security tied up in our job, or our physical well-being, or status, or healthy finances, or relationships? None of these things are wrong, but if they become essential to us in place of God, then they become idols.
Who does God say that you are? Scripture is full truths that speak of our identity in Him. What is essential for us to live is simply the assurance of our salvation and that He is our Shepherd and in Him we lack nothing (Psalm 23). The lockdown has served to strip away much of what we might consider essential but really is temporary and of this world. We have a fantastic opportunity to consider the extent to which our pre-lockdown life was lived in keeping with not only our core values, but in our God given identity, and then make Holy Spirit inspired and intentional changes to how we live in the next season.
This of course and always is about self-awareness, and these are great questions that we can be asking ourselves as well as our clients as we seek with God’s help to live out our essential identity in Him.
I have written a reflective worksheet taking clients through these questions and more. If this is something you would like for yourself, or for someone else, do email me and I will happily send you a copy.
Catriona Futter leads CCNI’s monthly Coaches in Europe Community group and lives in Glasgow Scotland. She is passionate about helping people identify, understand, and celebrate their unique God-given design and purpose. Catriona Futter, can be reached at catriona@equipforlifecoaching.com.
