Who are you? What gives a man his identity?
On what foundation are you building your sense of self? Your answer, whether
true or false, defines your life.
Wrong ways of defining who we are
arise naturally in our hearts, and the world around us preaches and models
innumerable false identities. But Jesus maps out and walks out a
counterintuitive and countercultural way to know who you are. Your true
identity is a gift of God, a surprising discovery, and then a committed choice.
What are the ways men get identity
wrong? Perhaps you construct a self by the roles and accomplishments listed on
your résumé. You might identify yourself by your lineage or ethnicity, by your
job history or the schools you attended, by your marital status or parental
role. Perhaps you define who you are by your political leanings or the objects
of your sexual longings. Maybe you consider yourself to be summed up in a
Myers-Briggs category or a psychiatric diagnosis. Your sense of self might be
based on money (or your lack thereof), on achievements (or failures), on the approval
of others (or their rejection), on your self-esteem (or self-hatred). Perhaps
you think that your sins define you: an angry man, an addict, an anxious
people-pleaser. Perhaps afflictions define you: disability, cancer, divorce.
Even your Christian identity might anchor in something that is not God: Bible
knowledge, giftedness, or the church denomination to which you belong.
In each case, your sense of identity
comes unglued from the God who actually defines you.
God’s way of sizing up a man goes against
the grain of our instinctive opinions and strategies. Here are six basic
realities to orient you:
-
Your true identity is
who God says you are. You will never discover who you are by looking inside
yourself or listening to what others say. The Lord gets the first word because
he made you. He gets the daily word because you live before his face. He gets
the last word because he will administer your final “comprehensive life
review.
- ”Your true identity
inseparably connects you to God. Everything you ever learn about who God is—his
identity—correlates specifically to something about who you are. For example,
“your Father knows your need” means you are always a dependent child. “Jesus
Christ is your Lord” means you are always a servant.
- Who God is also
correlates with how you express your core identity as your various roles in
life develop. For example, the Bible says that God’s compassion for you is like
that of a father with his children (Ps. 103:13). You will always be a dependent
child at your core, but as you grow up into God’s image, you become
increasingly able to care for others in a fatherly way.
- Your instinctive sense
of identity is skewed. In the act of suppressing the knowledge of God (Rom.
1:18–23), a fallen heart suppresses true self-knowing. Whenever we forget God,
we forget who we are.
- A true and enduring
identity is a complex gift of Christ’s grace. He gives a new identity in an act
of mercy. Then his Spirit makes it a living reality over a lifetime. When you
see him face to face, you will know him as he truly is, and you will fully know
who you are (1 Cor. 13:12).
- Your new and true
identity connects you to God’s other children in a common calling. It is not
individualistic. You are one member in the living body of Christ.
Now consider a few of the details.
Don’t skim through. You will never be gripped by these truths if you treat them
merely as an information download.
- All good gifts,
beginning with life itself, come from God. You will never be independent. The
Lord sustains our lives physically. And every word from the mouth of God gives
life. And, supremely, Jesus Christ is the bread of life. Faith knows and
embraces this core identity: “I am his dependent.”
- Our dependency as
created beings is compounded, complicated, and intensified by sins and by
sufferings. To know ourselves truly is to know our need for help. Faith knows
and embraces this core identity: “I am poor and weak.”
- The Lord is merciful to
the wayward. He redeems the sinful, forgetful, and blind. Faith knows and
embraces this core identity: “I am sinful—but I am forgiven.”
God is our Father. He
adopts us in Christ, and by the power of the Spirit, he gives us a childlike
heart. We need parenting every day. We need tender care, patient instruction,
and constructive discipline. Faith knows and embraces this core identity: “I am
God’s child.”
- The Lord is our refuge.
Our lives are beset by a variety of troubles, threats, and disappointments. We
aren’t strong enough to stand up to what we face. God’s presence is the only
safe place. Faith knows and embraces this core identity: “I am a refugee.”
- The Lord is our
shepherd. He laid down his life for the sheep. He watches over our going out
and coming in. We need looking after and continual oversight. Faith knows and
embraces this core identity: “I am a sheep in his flock.”
- Christ is Lord and
Master. He bought us with a price; we belong to him. We need someone to tell us
what to do and how to do it. Faith knows and embraces this core identity: “I am
a servant, indentured for life.”
- The Lord is married to
his people. He patiently nourishes and cherishes his wife, the living body of
Christ. We need husbanding from someone faithful, kind, protective, and
generous. Faith knows and embraces this core identity: “I submit to Jesus.”
- God searches every man’s
heart. We live before his eyes. Faith knows and embraces this core identity: “I
am a God-fearing man.”
- Our God is good, mighty,
and glorious. He is worthy of our trust, esteem, gladness, and gratitude. Faith
knows and embraces this core identity: “I am a worshiper.”
We could go on! The pattern is
obvious. Every core aspect of a man’s identity expresses some form of humility,
need, submission, and dependency before the Lord. Our culture and our hearts
might claim that masculinity means being independent, self-confident, proud,
strong, assertive, decisive, tough-minded, opinionated, and unemotional. But
Jesus is the true man, and he is unafraid of weakness, lowliness, and
submission. He came as a helpless and endangered child. He became dependent,
poor, afflicted, homeless, submitted—an obedient servant entrusted with a
job to do. He became a mere man and died in pain—committing his spirit into
God’s hands, depending by faith on the power of the Spirit to raise him. He
feels every emotion expressed in the Psalms.
Yet Jesus is also strong. He is
leader, teacher, and Lord. He speaks with decisive authority. He helps the
weak. He forgives the sinful. He has mercies to give away. He faces the
hostility of men with courage and clarity. He lives purposefully. He goes out
looking for his lost sheep. He does the things God does.
How did these two things fit
together in Jesus’s life, and how do they fit together in ours? Here is the
pattern: Core identity as a man leads to the calling to act like God. Weakness
leads to strength. Serving leads to mastery. Deaths lead to resurrections. It
never works the other way around. When your core identity is meek and
lowly—like Jesus—then your calling develops into his image of purposeful, wise,
courageous love. You become like God.
The order matters. You become
generous and merciful to others by continually receiving generous mercies. You
learn how to protect others by finding refuge in the Lord. You develop into a
good father by living as a well-fathered child of your Father. You develop into
a masterful leader by living as a well-mastered servant. You develop into a
wise teacher by being a well-taught learner. You learn how to husband a wife in
love by being well-husbanded by Christ. You develop into a caring pastor of
others by living as a well-pastored sheep of your Shepherd. You become a
surprisingly good counselor by being well-counseled by your Wonderful
Counselor.
Of course, in much of life, we
function in roles where others are over us, and we live in honorable dependency
and submission. “Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution” (1
Pet. 2:13). Leaders in one sphere submit in other spheres. The pastor of your
church is subject to the church’s governing authorities. A father of children
owes honor to his own mother and father. When your core identity is in Christ,
you bear fruit whether he calls you to serve as a leader or to serve as a
servant.
Finally, consider that all your
present callings will someday come to an end. When you grow old, frail, and
helpless, you will become someone else’s charge and responsibility. But your
true identity is imperishable. You will still abide in Christ. And when he
appears, you will appear with him in glory (Col. 3:4).
David Powlison is a faculty member
at CCEF and a council member for The
Gospel Coalition. David has been counseling for more than 30 years. His books
include Speaking Truth in Love; Seeing with New Eyes; Power
Encounters: Reclaiming Spiritual Warfare; and The Biblical Counseling
Movement: History and Context.
