Would the Real Me Stand Up

In his book, Road Back to You, author Ion Cron writes of his encounter with a Catholic priest that was a pivotal moment in shaping his identity and journey in Christ. Brother Dave, the priest said,

“What we don't know about ourselves can and will hurt us, not to mention others. As long as we stay in the dark about how we see the world and the wounds and beliefs that have shaped who we are, we're prisoners of our history.”

Until we come fully face to face with who we are and who we’re not – good and bad – we can be prisoners stuck on the spin cycle. Keep making the same mistakes, keep hurting ourselves and others with the same patterns. That’s interesting – we’ll come back to that.

It's been a while since we talked about identity – today and with one more. A little refreshing – we want to be a people who help others reach their potential in Christ.

2 Timothy 3:16–17 ESV

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

Complete - artios – means to be proficient, capable to do whatever God wants us to do and be whoever he designed us to be. That’s potential- purpose.

Ephesians 2:10 ESV

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

We've talked a lot about what it means to pursue our potential, but a quick reminder -

Pursuing potential means to be continuously transformed into the very person that God designed us to be (progressive sanctification).

– pursuit of holiness / Christlikeness). In Ephesians 1 we discover that we were predestined to be in Christ, and it is in Christ where we discover who we were meant to be – In Christ we discover our potential, purpose, and identity - all wrapped up in Christ.

We’ve talked about this before but it’s important to reiterate. What happens when people try to find their identity apart from Christ? What happens when they try to find their identity with what’s in vogue, or in a career, or sexuality, or whatever – name anything? It all comes back to the same conclusion -

Everything apart from Christ will either change, be lost, or go out of style.

So, if you’re gaining your identity from health, money, career, fashion … it will all go away. But

Identity and potential in Christ never change and never will.

He is our firm foundation, our Rock of ages – all other ground really is sinking sand.

The world knows that we have an identity crisis, but the world keeps trying to fix the identity crisis by always changing the rules, or boundaries, or standards. That’s the way of humanity. Rather than acknowledging God and conforming to his standards, which would actually bring about what we're all looking for, we’d rather do life our own way which only perpetuates chaos, confusion, and evil. At the root of it all is sin – breaking God’s commandments.

Romans 6:23 – wages of sin is death. All kinds of things die, including identity, knowing who we are in God. When Adam and Eve sinned they no longer knew who they were in relation to God, to one another, with self, and even their environment.

Sin introduced separation, fear, shame, blame, and death into the human heart, soul, and mind.

Because of sin, and because we have a very real spiritual enemy, humanity has struggled with identity ever since. It could be argued that the most basic questions ever asked by humans are - “Who am I? Why do I exist? What’s my purpose? Do I even matter?” This is a universal human condition – the question of identity. I believe nearly every problem we as humans face can be traced to an identity issue. David Benner, in his book, “The Gift of Being Yourself” wrote,

“In all creation, identity is a challenge only for humans.” ~ David Benner

Why? Sin.

Why is the world the way it is? We have an identity crisis on a global scale.

Going back to what Brother Dave said,

“What we don't know about ourselves can and will hurt us, not to mention others. As long as we stay in the dark about how we see the world and the wounds and beliefs that have shaped who we are, we're prisoners of our history.”

Until we recognize we might have some false beliefs about self or God, or that we may have some wounds that need to be healed, or maybe we’re looking at the world through tainted glasses, it's very likely will be stuck any painful cycle of hurting ourselves and others.

I don’t know who said this, but I like it –

“The greatest source of suffering is believing the lies we believe about ourselves.”

There’s a lot of truth to that. We can do a lot with that, but no matter what, it all comes back to identity (how I view self and God).

Identity is a massive issue. Suicide? Relationships? How important was identity for Jesus?

Matthew 1:1 ESV

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Matthew 3:17 ESV

and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

Matthew 4:3 ESV

And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.”

If the devil tried to get Jesus to doubt His identity, how much more will the enemy attack our identity and cause us to question and doubt who we are to be in Christ?

How many of you know someone who is struggling with their identity?

So, what do we do? The next time I talk about identity, we’ll talk about self-awareness and what that means as a Christian. But for now,

Acknowledge that most of the problems we face are identity issues.

When I allow God to use me and who He’s designed me to be, that’s a blessing and an identity thing. Or, when you start asking what’s wrong with this world …, remember, it’s probably an identity issue. When we acknowledge that, it’s a reminder that everyone needs Jesus.

Believe that Jesus Christ is the answer.

He's the answer for our identity issues and He's the answer for our neighbors and communities and their identity issues.

And if you've never received Jesus Christ as your savior, believe and receive Jesus Christ and His offer of forgiveness and salvation. Jesus is where the journey towards your authentic identity begins.

Don’t just believe that Jesus is the answer, but also

Believe what God says about you.

Believing what God says about us (humanity) is perhaps the most important belief to have. If He says you're a sinner, you’re a sinner. If He says you're a saint, you're a saint. If He says you're a child of God, adopted, and loved, then you better believe it.

Look, we’re a war for identity. We have a very real enemy who’s doing everything he can to keep us from realizing who we truly are in Christ. We’re in a war. Now, when you join the military, one of the first things they do is shape your identity. One of the ways they form this new identity is through memorizing a creed, because when you get in a combat situation, you cannot afford to forget who you are.

For example –

Soldier’s Creed

I am an American Soldier.

I am a warrior and a member of a team.

Sailor’s Creed I am a United States Sailor.

The Airman’s Creed I am pampered and spoiled.

The Airman’s Creed I am an American Airman. I am a Warrior.

Start remembering who you are in Christ. Begin with

John 1:12–13 ESV

But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

Take Captive false beliefs and thoughts

2 Corinthians 10:3–5 ESV

For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,

I wrote in my Bible,

“Reject false assignments spoken over us or ones we believe.”

When we walk with Christ, believe what He says, and reject the lies, our real identity begins to emerge and that’s what Jesus wants and that’s what the world needs.