Christ As Our Identity

My identity is Christ. I am not a crazy person who believes he is Christ. I am a person who by the grace of God no longer knows himself outside of who Christ Is and what He has done.

I remember resisting believing in Jesus in every way possible. I identified everything having to do with Him as foreign and strange... monks who lived outside of society and became silent, fanatics, angry people who thought everything was bad and that the world was ending at any moment and passive people with saccharine smiles who acted like everything was nice and rosy. In my mind Jesus was for weak minded people. I wanted my voice and to slip out of the bonds that held me and was wary of submitting myself under some other bondage.

I did eventually believe in Jesus. The evidence was too overwhelming. But, I can't say He was my identity at first.

"But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain." - 1 Corinthians 15:10a ESV

I think it is very possible that grace can work on you but not in you. That people can have an outward identification with a version of Jesus and never know grace at all. The person who insists that they are Jesus Christ or the raging legalist who condemns everyone who deviates from a strict line of thinking to Hell both use an idea of Jesus to find shelter or justification for what is really is their heart and never find the love in God's heart..

"For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ." - Galatians 3:26-27 ESV

Our adoption into God's family hings on Christ's work.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places," - Ephesians 1:3 ESV

Our spiritual blessings are in Christ also. Our spiritual identity is in Christ but do we see ourselves that way or is he just a another cut out for our spiritual collage. There is little power in our faith until He becomes more than that.

"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," - 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 ESV

Are we wearing a Christian uniform or are we wearing Christ the gentle healer filled with grace and truth, the great I am and the Alpha and Omega.

No one can condemn us when our identity is Christ and we have put on Jesus Christ leaving no provision for our self life (see Romans 13:14). The amazing thing that happens is that we don't lose out voice and we don't become subjective fanatics. We are free and whole because man was created to be linked to God. We find a home when our identity is lost in Christ Himself.

We not longer say, 'I am an orphan.' instead we say, 'I am a son (or daughter)' because Christ is my doorway and anchor within the veil of holiness.

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