Identity Crisis!
February 8, 2009The former head of the National Association of Evangelicals is presently going through an identity crisis. By his own admission, he is struggling to define his true nature. This is a definite problem for those who still live under the law and so cannot see who they are from God’s viewpoint. Christians live in the new way of the Spirit and not under the law but under grace. How does one become the leader of this national evangelical group without knowing this? This struggle tells us of the condition of the church spiritually. Jesus was certainly right when He said, “They do not know what they are doing.”
In his struggle this former leader said of himself, “I’m so thrilled about the way my life is now….I am becoming the man now that everybody thought I was.” At this point he is proud of what he has been able to accomplish for himself. This is not the confession of a Christian.
Obviously he thinks he is becoming something that an improved behavior can bring him. But a true Christian knows that one’s own efforts cannot achieve a Godly goal. St. Paul understood this completely. He declared, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.” (Rom.7:15) That, in a nutshell is the story of all men. There is none who do good. So what is the Christian to do, especially when Christ told us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect.
Our identity is determined by the work of God through Christ. And it is so forensically. In other words, what we are is what God has declared us to be through His Son. For instance; Christ Jesus has become for us wisdom from God, that is, our righteousness, holiness, and redemption. (1 Cor. 1:30) And what God has declared us to be is eternally real, while what we are humanly speaking is as dead as a door nail. Our struggling friend, if he indeed believes in Christ, needs to believe what God says about him. Remember, Abraham of old? Well, he believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.
The sad story is this: “Christians” will say that they believe in Christ. But then they refuse to believe what God says about them. Instead they do their own thing and ask God to approve of their behavior. That is not Christianity.
