If you missed Charity’s previous post on identity from Colossians, you can read it here.
May you be strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience, with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
I am weak.
This is something I say and hear others say often.
I am…
Those are powerful words. When we say, “I am…” we are revealing how we view our identity, but we are also revealing how we view God.
As followers of Christ, we are given a new identity and a new name. This identity was bought by the precious blood of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. What if by saying things like “I am weak. I am unloving. I am lustful. I am prideful. I am undeserving,” you fill in the blank… we are actually causing the heart of God to break?
Let me pause to clarify for a minute. I’m not talking about confession and repentance which are acts of seeking and returning to God and His truth and life. I’m talking about the negative self-talk we participate in concerning our identities where we reserve ourselves to hopelessness, despair and sin.
God does not take negative self-talk “I am” statements lightly. He says that He is the great I AM. Jesus says, “I AM the bread of life, I AM the way, the truth and the light, I AM the living water.” God is very serious about who He is, and I believe He wants us to be serious about who we are too. He wants us to be serious about our new identity in Christ.
Please stop believing the lie that you are weak. You probably had to do a double-check of what I just said. It seems crazy I know. Before you write me off as a heretic, hear me out.
If you have believed in Jesus as your Savior, you are not weak. Jesus has given you His Spirit and we cannot comprehend just how strong He is. He is the one who worked miracles by the command of the Father and Jesus. Now, that same Spirit is in us empowering us to do what God created us to do—to worship and love Him. The Spirit is empowering us to persevere and to have patience and joy in the process.
Brother and sister, you are not weak because you are in Christ and have His Spirit inside you. If you believe in Jesus, then the Spirit has and is changing your heart to desire what He desires and you are IN CHRIST. Nothing can take you out of Him, so you are strong in the Spirit, strong because the Spirit is IN you. You are not strong in yourself but strong because you are in Christ through the Spirit.
Some of you reading this are frustrated and skeptical. I don’t blame you at all! This is something that I have struggled and wrestled with God for a long time and continue to do so.
What I have learned is that there is a difference between who I am and what I feel. This is crucial to understand. One thing that people who are close to me know is that I feel deeply. God has used this in beautiful ways in my life. I am discovering that God uses that mode of communication with me frequently. Sometimes it is hard to hear God in this way because feelings are fickle. Not all of them are from God and it can be hard to overcome feelings that are not from Him because in the moment they are real.
I wish I could tell you I have a formula for how to get past feelings and believe Truth. I do not think that is what God wants for us though. He created feelings so I know they are not bad. They are just… scary and confusing at times.
When you are overwhelmed by feelings of weakness, lust, pride, an unloving spirit, or whatever struggle you are facing, breath deep and remember what you feel is not always who you are. The Spirit is inside you waiting for you to realize His power that has and is making your weakness into strength through grace. He longs for you to ask and keep asking for power to endure until you believe that you truly are in Christ and have power to overcome.
I don’t want to undermine what you feel. I know what it is like to lie on your bed motionless and despairing because you just can’t handle life. My prayer is that in those moments, you hear the Spirit whisper, “I understand, and you are strong because I am with you.” Whatever dialogue is happening in your head right now, replace the lies with Truth.
Earlier, I said that what we say about ourselves reflects how we see God. When we label ourselves as our feelings, sin and shortcomings, we are denying the reality and power and hope of who Jesus is and what He accomplished in His death and resurrection. You may be asking why this is. As confessing believers, we claim to have Christ’s identity. When I say negative things about who I am, I am saying that is who Christ is because I received my identity from Him.
What is the alternative? How do we acknowledge our weaknesses and shortcomings without degrading Christ or the identity He has graciously given us? I think the answer lies in a change of thinking which first starts by a change of language. Instead of saying, “I am weak,” or “I am a failure,” we should acknowledge them as they are, as feelings: “I FEEL weak” and “I FEEL like I have failed.” This acknowledges our need and desire for the Spirit’s help without degrading the identity of Christ in us.
Do you see the difference between what we feel and who we are?
What we feel does not change the overarching reality of who we are in Christ by His Spirit.
This has changed the way I view God and myself and I pray it does the same for you. I pray you begin the journey to believing who God says you are not who you feel like you are.
And who are you?
You are a saint of the Light and you share in that inheritance.
You are delivered from darkness.
You are a citizen of the Kingdom of the beloved Son.
You are redeemed.
You are forgiven.
No matter what you are feeling in this moment the Truth is, if you believe in Jesus you are His.
If we can grasp God’s desire for us to know who we are because of Christ, not only is that going to give us fullness of life, but others will see that fullness and be drawn to God through our knowledge of who we are in Christ. Others will want to know the assurance we have.
Don’t be discouraged either. It is a process. We will have good and bad days, and we must give ourselves grace. We will need God to show us grace and will need to show ourselves grace, but if we want to know God deeply we must first know and accept who He calls us.
Our lives should be marked by an ever-increasing knowledge and confidence in who He says we are so that we can run and jump after Him freely because we are not weighed down by the lies of who we once were. As we grow in knowledge and confidence, we are able to receive and discover even deeper truths He has in store for us.
God’s desire for us is complete freedom from our old selves. That will come one day. In the meantime, He desires us to live in Christ’s identity as much of the time as we are able remembering that when we forget who we are He is there to remind us.
Author Spotlight:
Hello! I’m the C to KC & Co! My name is Charity, and I am so excited you are checking out our site and blog. My deepest desire is that God will use the words on this blog to encourage, strengthen and deepen your love for Jesus. Read more of my writing here.
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[…] If you missed Charity’s previous post on identity from Colossians, you can read it here. […]