Identity in Christ
Let not what the world says define you, but be defined by the God who truly loves you.
In fact, you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. Indeed, as many of you as were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ. There is not Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, for you are all one and the same in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants and heirs according to the promise. (Galatians 3:26–29, EHV)
Our culture has made how we identify ourselves of paramount importance - what political party we identify with, what type of person we identify as, what train of thought we align with. We feel forced to pick sides in a black and white paradigm that knows no right or wrong. These identities are not rooted in absolute truth, but are rather the world’s opinion of us and our opinion of ourselves.
Yet, we are flawed, and our reason and senses are imperfect. Ever since our first parents fell into sin, our sense of reality has been tainted, including our ability to define ourselves. None of us wants to wear the badge of a sinner, but that’s exactly what we are - sinful. Maybe we’re like the Pharisees, and are tempted to cover up our sins by appearing perfect and righteous on the outside, and are prideful that the world calls us “good people.” Or, perhaps, we rebrand our sin as really being something good, even though we know that it’s wrong.
Truth is, we’re all struggling with something, and the reality is that it’s crushing either way. It’s crushing when the person we display on the outside doesn’t match the person we know on the inside. It’s crushing when we realize that the way we’re living is truly wrong, with our conscience vexing us. We are all terrified of the fact that we are sinners and that there is a righteous God whose justice will prevail. We’re terrified of being separated from him, yet we can’t seem to be good enough to reconcile ourselves with him. As the Psalmist wrote, “If you, Lord, kept a record of guilt, O Lord, who could stand?”1
We can try to run away from our sin, we can try to bottle it up and hold it in, we can try to pretend it isn’t there, but nothing changes. We are still sinners who deserve eternal separation from the God who created us. We can’t escape the mountain that looms ahead of us. There is nothing that we could do that would move it out of our way. This hard-hitting reality about our human nature causes us to all be despairing at the end of the day. To know that, regardless of what spin we put on our identity, we still face the same outcome with no means of escape. We are lost, broken, and without hope in our state of depravity.
Yet, God didn’t leave us here without an answer. God couldn’t walk away from the creation that walked away from him. For God is not merely just, but rather, he is foremostly merciful. Through the Prophet Hosea, God reveals His merciful nature. “For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings.”2 You see, there is nothing that you or I could ever do to earn God’s favor, just as the sacrifices and offerings that the Israelites made did not, in and of themselves, satisfy God. In our state of weakness, we would fail all the more if we even tried to earn our way back to him.
God, instead, didn’t just help us part of the way; he helped us all the way and more. Through the innocent, righteous, holy, perfect, and vicarious (or substitutionary) life, death, and resurrection of his only begotten Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, he paid the ransom price for our sinfulness. He washed away all the sins of the world with the blood of his dear Son. He took away all of the guilt and shame that came from the weight of our sin pressing down on us. He moved the mountain of sin that lay in front of our path, so that we could be reunited with him. He crossed out the name “sinner” on our name tag and instead wrote “saint.” He turned our reality on its head and restored us to who we were always meant to be.
All of this he offers as a gift, freely due to his divine mercy. If we look at what Paul wrote above in his epistle (letter) to the Galatians, he says, “In fact, you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” Before, we were just slaves to sin. Before, our identity was equal to our condition. However, God surprises us here in this very sentence. Read that statement again, “you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” With what Jesus has done, God has decided to call you his dear child. You are his son or daughter, who has been made new by faith. God has decided to look on you with the same favor as he looks at his Son, Jesus.
In this passage, Paul also offers us further comfort. He goes on to say, “Indeed, as many of you as were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ.” Many of us who have grown up in the faith were probably baptized at some point in our lives, whether we were just small infants or whether we were old enough to remember. Through this washing, God gives us a lasting comfort - a physical, tangible sign by which he has chosen to mark us as his children. Furthermore, this baptism - this washing of regeneration and renewal3 makes us new, clothed in the robe of Christ’s righteousness. When we were baptized, it wasn’t just a mere symbol; it was a literal, actual, real washing of all of our sins away and drowning of our old, sinful being in the font.
Our identity is no longer found in our sinfulness; it’s rather found in Christ. How wondrous it is that our Savior’s sacrifice is able to make us completely new people. God assures us, “As distant as the east is from the west, I have removed your rebellious acts from you.”4 Our sin is completely gone, and we are made new because of his abundant mercy and love for us.
We may continue to struggle with temptations in our lives, but that’s exactly why Christ has given us his means of grace and urges us to make continual and regular use of them. We already mentioned baptism, but the very root of our faith is found in the word that makes the Sacraments powerful - God’s Word. It is here, and here alone, that God reveals himself to us.
It is here, in his word, that God made his promise to Abraham that from his descendants would come the Messiah, the savior of the world. You and I, as Paul writes, become a part of this powerful promise, for “if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants and heirs according to the promise.” We, who belong to Christ by faith in his word, have been wrapped up in this plan of rescue. We have become heirs of the promise by which God intends to sustain us eternally. We possess the gift of heaven, of eternal life in the light of our Savior.
While the world overwhelms us with its gullible idea and definition of who we are, God points to who we truly are. In God’s eyes, what matters most is not your ethnicity, your gender, or your status in the eyes of the world. You are all one and the same in Christ Jesus. You are a child of God, and you share this status with every other Christian in the world.
So if Christ loved you so much that he gave up his life for you, how will he not also sustain you through this world, if you are his child? Not only will he provide for all the little moments and keep you through life’s turbulent storms, but you have the hope of heaven in him. So do not be afraid.5 Look up, and remember. You are his beloved, and nothing can ever change that.
Psalm 130:3, Evangelical Heritage Version.
Hosea 6:6, ibid.
These are the words used by Paul to describe baptism and its salvific nature in Titus 3:5.
Psalm 103:12, ibid.
A noteworthy thing to mention about this phrase (and its adjacent, “fear not”) is that it occurs over 100 different times in the Bible. God wants to continually remind us not to be afraid of him because he is here to bless us amidst our troubles. God will never hurt us, unlike other people, society, and the world have the habit of doing so.