So the question of the hour becomes: Whose do you think you are?

We spend incredible amounts of time defining who we are. Our clothes signal who we are. Our degrees say who we are: Dr. So and So, The Rev. Holy So and So. But there comes a time when knowing who we are is not enough. We have to know whose we are.

One thing I know for sure, everyone of you within the sound of my voice has either been in a wreck, will be in a wreck, or has just come through a wreck. That's life. Sooner or later, no matter how good you are, trouble still shows up on your door. Things fall apart. Your finances fall apart. Your husband leaves you, your wife leaves you. A loved one dies and you can't quit crying. You want to quit smoking, drinking, or drugging and you don't know how. Sooner or later our foundations crash and it is then we must know whose we are.

For example, in my own case, on July 1, my ship wrecked. I was called in to my supervisor's office at USA Today and told that the column I had been writing for 8 years and my job as an editor was terminated on the spot. I had been with the company 13 years, I had virtually started with USA Today. And now, for whatever reasons, in ten minutes I was downsized. Terminated. Zapped.

Later I remember backing into a wall as I wheeled from the parking lot. Later my body turned cold, my neck went numb and I sank into a deep depression and sense of despair. Then the media started calling me for a reaction and for once I found myself on the other side of the headlines. I was so glad, though, that before the job wreck, I had already booked a trip to London for myself and my son.

Ten days later I was in London. And there I found out about the lovely gardens in Hyde Park. Every day I would steal away just for a little talk with Jesus. In the garden, just like the song says, you know:

"I come to the garden alone,
While the dew is still on the roses;
And the voice I hear, falling on my ear
The Son of God discloses.
And He walks with me, and He talks with me,
And he tells me I am his own...."
And there in the garden I found answers.

First, I had asked God why we are so often persecuted, treated so unfairly when we have done nothing wrong. What I came to understand as I stood in the garden alone is that we should put those balloons and noise makers away and stop our little pity parties. In John, chapter 15, verses 18-20, Jesus tells his disciples: "If the world hates you, you know that it hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love his own, but because you are not of the world's system, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you."

And then Jesus said: Remember, "the servant is not greater than his Lord. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you." In other words, he reminded his disciples whose they were. As Christians, we often identify with the power of Christ, but not his pain. We want to share his crown but not his cross. We want to rise in this world, with him and through him, but suffer none of his rejection or humiliation.

Whose do we think we are?

Now let's look at Paul's situation. Paul's preaching and teaching had resulted in his arrest. Now as we look at chapter 27, Paul, along with some other prisoners, were put on a ship and were on their way to Rome for a trial. Then suddenly a violent tornado hits the ship. And as the storm gets worse and all begin to fear for their lives, strangely enough only Paul can say with confidence what the future holds. He tells them in verse 22, "For there shall be no loss of any man's life among you, but of the ship."

You see Paul could separate the wreck from the person. So often with us we can't separate who we are from our situation. You lose your job; well, the job wrecks. But the job is not you. Maybe this is why I hurt so bad when my job wrecked, maybe I thought I was Ms. USA Today. We may have a title. But the title only explains how we earn our living. Our job title does not tell whose we are.

When our ship sinks, we don't have to sink with it, if we know whose we are. As Christians, we work for Jesus Christ, CEO. And that is what Paul stresses when he told his captives... except you abide in the ship, you can not be saved.

Now Paul was not talking about abiding in a physical ship, but in the spirit of the living God. Jesus tells us in John 15, verse 4, "Abide in me, and I in you. I am the vine and ye are the branches." How many of you know that there is power through the vine, there is safety in the spirit? That is, if we know whose we are, and we're connected.

This is the real reason that Paul could talk with such confidence. He knew whose he was. He says in verse 23: "For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve."

Paul says that there was an angel standing by and that is why whatever storm that comes, whatever wreck that casts us into treacherous waters, we are not going to drown. Because we have somebody, our Savior, standing by. And that is why today I have a smile on my face. Because I know that when one job door closes, others open. Why? Because my God is standing by and I can stand on the promises of God. Already, since my job wreck, I have been blessed abundantly. Sure I wept, but just like he promised, weeping may endure for a season but joy comes in the morning.

And of course, Paul and everyone on the boat got back to shore alive. In verse 44 it says some on boards, and some on broken pieces and so it came to pass, just like Paul had said it would. They all escaped safely to land. And I am here to tell you, that if your ship wrecks, hang on, abide in God, and you will not go down with the ship. You will make it to higher ground if you know whose you are and depend upon the God you serve.

Praise His Holy Name.

Barbara Reynolds: You know, I think that they're not two estranged ideas. I think that you are communicating when you are a journalist. Usually it's what didn't happen, what should have happened. It's the bad news. But when you go to the good news, then you can tell how things will work out. The unexpected happened. Those who were lost, were found. Those who didn't have a chance, made it. So, I think it's all about communications, and I think you go from full circle by being a journalist. As a columnist, I tried to have a prophetic voice. I tried to point out where the country should go. I tried to point out the good that people should do. And as a minister, you still have a prophetic voice.

Talbot: Concerned with justice issues.

Reynolds: Yes, exactly.

Talbot: But there must have been something that inspired you to go to seminary.

Reynolds: You know, I never to this day thought I would go to the seminary. I had been exposed to great preachers, and I didn't know that people like the Reverend Jesse Jackson.

Talbot: You were his biographer.

Reynolds: I did his first biography. I knew him. I knew Corretta King, who was a very religious woman. I would go to stay at her house. My mother was very religious. But I didn't know that some of this was rubbing off on me, because I did not start out ever thinking that I would be in the ministry. It just unfolded little by little until I was, you know, there and had to make a decision.

Talbot: But there was a kind of Rubicon experience for you when your grandmother died.

Reynolds: She was a very religious person. You know the gospel song "Somebody Prayed for Me"? She always prayed for me, so I didn't have to worry about my own salvation as long as she lived. But when she died, I didn't have anybody else to pray for me. I was lost, and I began to seek some kind of comfort through the Word. And right here in Chicago, I was going to a middle class church, and I was very dissatisfied with it because, you know, we were too worried about how you dress and how you look. I remember asking people: is there anywhere around here that the spirit of the Lord is, and I can just go and there's just folks, and the spirit is there? And I went to church right on the north side of Chicago, and I had a very born-again experience. And I think that's where it all started. My life changed, and I began to seek the Lord.

Talbot: You used the word "prophetic", and I read that you received the Drum Major for Justice Award, awarded by the Southern Christian Leadership Convention. Was that part of this pilgrimage?

Reynolds: I didn't know what was going on because they awarded it to six female ministers and myself. I watched them preach, people like Reverend Barbara King and Leontine Kelly, a bishop of the United Methodist Church, and I watched them with awe. I never in my life even then thought that one day I would be Reverend Barbara Reynolds, but I've always been impressed, you know, by women ministers, but I never thought that I would be among them.

Talbot: Amazing...

Reynolds: It is amazing.

Talbot: ...the surprises in our life. Now I must ask you to back up, and talk more about that shipwreck you referred to in your earlier message. What was your dialogue with God when you lost your job with USA Today?

Reynolds: Well, as I went to my car in the parking lot, I had read a lot of Philippians 4, verse 16, where you learn to praise the Lord even in bad situations. So, I could hardly get a praise out because I was in tears and my stomach was twisted up in a knot, and I just said a very weak "Thank You, Jesus", knowing that, no matter how bad the situation looked, that eventually, it would be okay. I can't say I did it with a great "Thank You!" with a smile on my face, it was very weak. But I still wanted the Lord to know that I will still love Him even though I lost that job which He gave me in the first place, that with it or without it, I would still love Him.

Talbot: There's a sense of peace and liberation in your words. You know, you talked about going to the gardens in London with your son, Eric, who is 15 now...

Reynolds: Yes, right.

Talbot: ...and being able to experience a spiritual connectedness in that kind of setting, after your loss of a job.

Reynolds: I had to. I can't make you think that I wasa person with a smile on my face. When that happened, I was very torn up. But I had to get close to God. I had to go somewhere I could feel His presence. And, talking with Him, He reassured me that I would be blessed.

Talbot: I want to ask you: how in the world do you balance your career as a journalist, a minister, and a mother?

Reynolds: It's easier now. I think I'm getting used to it. Journalism and religion and being a mother, it just seems to flow. I'm amazed at what the Lord is putting in my path to do.

Talbot: You returned to your alma mater, Ohio State University, to give the commencement address, where you were told years earlier that you'd never make it as a journalist.

Reynolds: I was told in late sixties, when I wanted to be a journalist that because I am an African-American and a female, I'd never be a journalist. I, of course, went on with my life and, not too long ago, I received a letter from the president of the university, Dr. Gordon Gee. He said, "I would like for you to make the commencement address." And, I went there and we marched in together with the ROTC and the band and the orchestra. And when I stood up, I just felt the Lord was standing there, and I could look back at my mother, who was a maid, and she saved her money so her daughter could go to college. And I just said, "Lord, no one could have done this but you."