Message Minute (Beloved — Radically, at the Root)

"I will give you a new heart... and I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees." — Ezekiel 36:26-27

Author Brennan Manning once wrote that a person should define themselves radically as one beloved by God — that this is the true self, and every other identity is illusion.

Radically. Not casually. Not partially. At the root of who you are, you are beloved.

This is where the whole journey lands. God didn't perform a heart transplant just to leave someone to figure the rest out alone. He also placed His Spirit inside — the very Spirit that moves and empowers and leads. The new heart isn't just new; it's inhabited.

So, the invitation today is simple but not easy: stop performing for approval that's already been given. Stop hiding as if God doesn't already know everything and love fully anyway. Stop making yourself small and calling it humility.

You were made new. You are beloved. You have a good heart. And God delights in you — not in some future, cleaned-up version of you. Right now. Today.

Reflection: What would it look like to define yourself — radically, at the root — as someone beloved by God?

Prayer: God, let that word sink in today: beloved. Not tolerated, not pitied — beloved. Help me stop striving for what's already been given, and help me live from the fullness of who You've made me to be. Amen.