Defeating Giants

What is Identity?

Your name is not your identity:

When you call someone by their name like David, does that point to who they are as a person.

Saying David is a label with no meaning until it is elaborated on.

Most of us walk through life trying to find who we are, or, even more troubling, we allow life to define us. Often, we unconsciously accept who we are and remain in that state without realizing it.

We settle into what works to keep the suffering away from us. We make hundreds of choices each day from the place of false identity, and we don’t even know we are doing so.

“Everything flows from your identity and who you think you are.”

What exactly is identity?

Merriam Webster says: Identity = Distinguishing character, who a person is, qualities that make someone unique.

I say, An identity is a set of words that describes who a person is.

or you could say

An Identity is a nickname that describes who a person is.

God gives a nickname in some cases a real name.

You know it is an identity when you put the words ‘I am’ in front of it.

“God had a dream, and he wrapped your body around it”

- Lou Engle

I say “God duplicated a part of Him and wrapped you around that part of Him.”

I say “God had a dream and He created you as that dream, named you, and gave you an eternal purpose."

John 10:3 NASB95

3 “To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

Revelation 2:17 NASB95

17 ‘He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it.’

This nickname God calls us is our identity.

God only changes people’s names in the bible when the meaning of their name did not match their identity in Him.

Can you name people in the bible that God changed their names?

Abram become Abraham

Sarai becomes Sarah

Jacob become Israel

Simon becomes Peter

Saul is Paul

Levi is Matthew

Can you name people God nicked named?

David = a man after My own Heart. (Acts 13:22)

John = beloved, or the one whom Jesus loved. (John 20:2)

Mary = Highly favored one (Luke 1:28)

Gideon = Valiant Warrior (Judges 6:12)

John and James = The sons of thunder

Mark 3:17 NASB95

17 and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, “Sons of Thunder”);

Jesus = My Beloved son in who I am well pleased.

Like Simon, we often find our identity in what we do for work or one of our modes of being or roles we take in life. Simon found himself a fisherman just like his father and his father’s father. Some would say that Simon’s identity is a fisherman.

What you do is not your identity, even though many people get their identity out of what they do. It’s easier to label someone in what they do, so we don’t have to explain or search for who they really are. Underneath the surface of the labels we put on people is a unique person, and it takes some effort and curiosity to discover their unique true identity.

- Identity is a nickname or label that describes the essence of a person.

- An identity is what describes the substance of a person.

- An identity is what describes the vision of who that person is.

- An identity gives a clearer picture of a person's character, nature, and the way he or she acts.

- An Identity is a set of words that help people see the vision of who a person is and how that person acts out that vision.

An identity is given so that you can fulfill your unique purpose in life and impact the world around you.

- Identity is a belief system about yourself and directly affects how you manifest yourself to the world around you.

I know, I know, I just spat out many different ways to say the same thing. I can’t help it.

Identity is also massively impacted by who, where, or what you get your identity from.

If identity is a belief system about yourself, then that means you create a vision about yourself based on what you believe you are.

If someone claims their identity is that of a drummer, what happens if they lose the ability to play drums? If they can no longer play, how can they still identify as a drummer?

If you or anyone else claims to be something that can be taken away, then I propose that it is not your true identity. Maybe what you do is one of the best ways of demonstrating your identity, but you chose that career or hobby because of some deeper truth in you.

Your true identity can be fulfilled even when you lose some ability you used to have.

Your true identity is part of you in all seasons and even for the rest of eternity.

Three types of Identity.

Generic Identity

False Identity

True Identity

Generic Identity:

There is a difference between a generic identity and your unique true identity. Again, an identity is simply a label that helps describe a person more accurately.

Many people are sons,

Many people are daughters,

Many people are moms, and

Many people are dads.

All people are human,

All people are born to be loved,

All people are called to be the family of God.

We all have these aspects of ourselves, which can be interwoven into our identities. However, your true identity is more specific and unique to you.

After the generic identities we all have, we move on to more specific but still generic identities that paint a better picture of who we are or at least who we are trying to be.

Generic identities still contain the words ‘I am,’ but ‘I am’ is often followed by ‘a.’

Those look something like

I am a man

I am a woman

I am a husband

I am a wife

I am a son

I am a daughter

I am a hard worker

I am a friendly person

I am a musician

I am a police officer

I am a teacher

I am an influencer

I am a Left or Right politician

I am an Enneagram #1-9

When we put the words ‘I am a’ around even these generic titles, we begin to see a vision of who they could be; we begin to see how they or we should act because they are one of those roles.

False Identities:

A false identity is when you put the words I am in front of anything other than what God calls you.

How do false identities get into our subconscious and rule our lives?

We gather evidence through our experiences that proves the story we tell ourselves.

Why do we accept false identities as truth in our lives?

I believe we do that because we need an explanation for the pain we feel from rejection.

Here are some other very common false identities:

I am bad

I am abandoned

I am unworthy

I am no one

I am stupid

I am not enough

I am too much

Putting the words I am in front of the name you call yourself is an identity. It is a false identity if you do not hear your identity from the right source.

True Identity:

Very few people discover their true identity by accident. It does happen, but finding your true, unique identity requires intentionality. Even when you are intentional about it, you have to wrestle a bit to get clarity and keep that clarity.

A true, unique identity is when you find words or sometimes an image that you assign words to, which helps embody who you were created to be. A true identity allows you and those around you to see you for who you truly are.

Here are some examples of True Identities I have heard over the years.

I am Multinet Peace Maker

I am Freedom Fighter

I am Willing Arrow

I am Playful Cheerleader

I am Valiant Warrior

I am Highly Favored One.

I am Sacred Vessel.

I am Beautiful Freedom

I am Compassionate Fire

I am Brave Heart

Where do we get our identity from?

Our Father in Heaven

But our Father does not just tell us word that are our identity.

God duplicated a part of Him and formed you around that part of Him.

Then He gives us words and a visions about what that part of Him is about.

You are made in His image and only you can amplify that part of Him.

What happens after your hear your identity?

When Jesus gives you these words or that nickname, something miraculous happens.

His words are living and active and those words set in motion you becoming united to God and your true self.

Cutting away what does not belong.

Uniting body, soul, and spirit to truth.

Hebrews 4:12 NASB95

12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

Jesus walked Simon through seven questions over the course of three years, and Simon became Peter, with a clear purpose.

Activation:

Question #1: What is the most important thing you want me to know right now?

Question #2: What are the lies or false identities I believe about myself?

Question #3: What is the lie or false identity I believe about God?

Question #4: What is God's true identity in my life?

Question #5: What is my true Identity?

Question #6: What is my purpose as __________, __________?

Question #7: What is the next step you want me to take in walking out my true identity?

Resources:

Psalm 139:13–14 NASB95

13 For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. 14 I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well.

Jeremiah 1:5 NASB95

5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, And before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Ephesians 2:10 NASB95

10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.