How Are You Recognized?

The surprising power of our surroundings

Something surprising happened to me a few weeks ago at our local bookstore.

Finding a book I’ve been eager to read for sometime, I went to purchase it at the checkout counter. After exchanging a few words with the person helping me, he asked, “are you a seminary student?”

Surprised, I affirmed his hunch and asked if my book purchase gave it away.

“No,” he said laughing, “you guys just have a vibe so I could tell.”

Shaped by our surroundings

Who we surround ourselves with shapes us in significant ways.

Who we most spend our time with shapes our thoughts, feelings, clothing, hobbies, and dispositions so much that we can be lumped into a particular group just by another’s brief observation.

Something about the people with whom I'm surrounded by so shaped me that I could be recognized as a member of Princeton’s seminary community.

My time studying, learning, conversing, living among and sharing fellowship with a particular group of people in a particular place so affected my way of being that I was immediately recognized. I didn’t have to wear a badge or show an ID for this stranger to sense the people I entered his bookstore from.

This observation leads to a serious questions for followers of Jesus, how are we recognized?

Recognized by Jesus

In Acts 4, Peter and John faced this reality.

Brought before the religious authorities for healing a man who couldn’t walk from birth, they were intensely questioned. After a bit of tense dialogue with some preaching mixed in, the Jewish leaders make a striking omission.

“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.” (Acts 4:13).

By the way Peter and John spoke, behaved, and proclaimed they were recognized as people who had been been with Jesus.

These disciples had walked with Jesus, lived with him, broken bread with him, witnessed his miracles and healings, seen his crucifixion, death, and resurrection. Their closeness to Jesus could not be hidden. Their lives had been so saturated with Jesus they couldn’t help but be recognized as those who had been with him—who belonged to him.

Just like my time around other seminarians made it easy for me to be recognized by a stranger, so it was with Peter and John.

To whom do we belong?

But can we be recognized as those who have been with Jesus too?

Have we spent so much time with Jesus that we don’t just know about him but we live in such closeness to him and his people that we can’t help but be recognized as belonging to him?

Are our lives so palpably marked by the presence of Christ that we can’t help but have the loving aroma of Christ surrounding all that we do?

I invite you to pause and reflect on these questions. Take time to consider how your time, surroundings, and community shapes you. Ponder by what or whom others recognize you.

Consider—deeply and prayerfully—to whom do you belong?