Do You Know Who You Are?
Many in the world around us today need clarification about identity. Some cannot even figure out what gender or species they are. It really is unfortunate. This is happening increasingly because of authority figures in their life telling them the wrong things.
The same thing has happened in the church in many ways. Well-meaning authority figures have spent more time getting the children of God to identify with their old nature as opposed to their new one. This is not always or even often done maliciously. It results from being mistaken about where the emphasis should be placed.
Many are told how to fix themselves according to the flesh instead of being reminded of who they are according to the Spirit. This kind of instruction lends itself to relying on the power of one’s own strength to be righteous. It is the same tactic the law utilized to identify righteousness. Scripture says,
Romans. 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, 4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.
The idea of what it means to walk according to the flesh as it is being used here is when someone thinks that by their own strength can keep the law perfectly enough to obtain righteousness. That idea is mistaken and a recipe for failure, shame, and condemnation. It is out of step with knowing whom we have become in Christ. Those who tend to think this way focus on behavior with no regard for identity. The fact of what it means to be a new creation in Christ and all that the Father has declared about who they are now in Christ is left out of the discussion because behavioral modification is turned into their savior instead of their true Savior, Jesus Christ.
Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.”
The proper pathway to victory over behavioral struggles is to get one’s identity right. One cannot live from the power of being a new creation if one continually identifies with their old sinful nature and past life. If they disagree with the report of God as to who they truly are, they only have the strength of the flesh to rely on, and even at its strongest, it is still weak.
2Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.
Galatians 6:15 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.
Romans 8:14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.
Galatians 3:26 For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.
The pathway to true victory over your old life and any bondages is to know who you are now in Christ and thus be enabled to draw on the power of the Spirit to live according to His wisdom and guidance in your life. Life, according to the Spirit, is far more successful at bringing us into an experience of victory than trying to go back under the pressure of what we can do to better ourselves according to our own strength and willpower.
I encourage you today and always to live as a son of God made new in Christ and identify yourself according to what He says concerning you instead of what you think you know about yourself. All things are possible to him who believes! That is to him who believes the report of the Lord. Who gets to tell you who you are?
