Identified
Galatians 4:7 | You are free
“False identities are limitless and easy to embrace. The
world tells us that we can embrace any identity we want. As a result, we settle
on identities usually based on our performance and/or appearance: successful,
competent, polished, and popular.
Most of the time, we’re able to maintain these false
identities. I generally show up on time. I prepare well and usually do a pretty
good job. But sometimes I fail, and when I do, that identity cracks, and it can
feel like I’ve lost everything.” (Dash, 2022)
I borrowed an excerpt from Dash’s article, “Our True
Identity, Finding Our Identity in Christ”. And it was one, solitary statement
that struck me profoundly, “…sometimes I fail, and when I do, that identity
cracks, and it can feel like I’ve lost everything.” What a bold and honest statement about how we
feel in our identity or what we have identified with. And how much of our inner
turmoil, our outward reactions, our emotional struggle and mental baggage
hinges on the identity we have adopted or tried to identify with rather than our true identity?
In 1985, a Darmouth University study was conducted by Robert
Kleck to analyze the effects of facial scars or disfigurement in a job
interview. Except the study was not necessarily about the interviewer
responding to a facial disfigurement. It was however, about the way people interpreted
communication, feedback and actions toward them in the job interview setting
when they believed they had a scarring or disfigurement.
To begin the study, the subjects were brought into a room
and shown several photographs of real people who had similar facial
disfigurements. This initial part of the experiment served multiple purposes.
At the least, it would set the stage by exposing the subjects to their own
feelings, biases, and judgements in their responses to such pictures. The
subjects were then asked a series of questions about what they believed or
perceived would be the evidence of discrimination or even response to their own
facial scarring. In other words, how would they know that the interviewer would
be negatively responding to the scarring? Their responses were focused around
the lack of verbal comments or response rather than actual verbal response. The
subjects believed that if someone didn’t verbally
respond by mentioning the scarring
then that would be the negative response. They also answered that observing the
interviewer’s gaze pattern would indicate their feelings to seeing such
disfigurement. In summary, to those people, the real judgment would be in the
things that were not said in addition
to the ways in which the interviewer looked at them.
2 Corinthians 5:17 | You are a new person
The next stage of the study was executed as the subjects
were given cosmetically applied scarring and were allowed to see their own
scarring in a mirror prior to the interview. They were then allowed to go into
the interview. Upon completion of the interview, the subjects all had similar
responses. Most of the subjects reported that the feedback they received was
nonverbal and negative. They also reported that the interviewer offered negative
nonverbal communication in the form of gazing at the scar and also in their
failure to mention it. All subjects reported that there was noticeable bias and
negative feedback.
However, the results were fabricated based off of the
subject’s own bias, and ultimately their own identity. As it turns out,
immediately prior to the actual interview their stage makeup that created the
scarring was actually “touched up” and removed
completely. As they entered the interview the subjects had no scarring
whatsoever. Which means that their so-called negative feedback was simply a
product of their own mind and seen through the lens of their own projection and
self-confidence.
As I read through the study I begin to think about the times
I have viewed someone’s reactions, communications, lack of communications, or
behavior through the lens of my own identity and self knowledge. I view those
interactions through the filter of what I believe to be true about myself
whether that is my background, my mistakes, successes, failures, acquaintances
and connections, things that happened TO me, and even my thoughts. And how far
back does the pattern go? How many times have I filtered my world through the
lens of the labels and identity I gave myself or I simply allowed? And the
answer is, more than I want to admit.
Genesis 1:27 | You are made in God’s image
I was recently contacted by someone who felt the need to
remind me of some mistakes I made many years ago. Upon questioning this person,
they quickly retreated with this statement, “Oh, I didn’t mean to send that to
you”, which immediately led to more questions. The first question was, “Why are
you sending this to me?” And the second question was, “If it wasn’t meant for
me, then who was it meant for?” The truth, in whatever fashion it happened, was
meant to be a reminder to me about my wrongs as well as an unspoken reminder
that it hasn’t been forgotten, and apparently, not forgiven. And it had the
desired effect, I admit. Immediately, I was filled with memories, thoughts, self-berating
statements of my failures. That hit-and-run tactic to mentally derail me worked.
Days later, God’s truth spoke through me. God began to
remind me that either I am forgiven through Jesus Christ, or God is a liar. And
I couldn’t choose both of those options. I had to either accept forgiveness or
I had to admit that God had lied to me. And if I didn’t want to claim that God
was a liar, then why was I willing to accept an identity that was not mine? I
believe this was a turning point in my life, and in my journey overall. Was I
willing to accept truth? If I was, and if I wanted to walk in the steps that God
has laid out for me, then I had to relinquish any identity that did not belong
to me, no matter who wanted me to wear it.
Galatians 3:13 | You are rescued
This moment of truth did not come in gentle prayers as I talked
with God. It did not come in tears of more regret
and guilt while I sat in a corner to hide from my decisions. It could have, it
certainly could have. But rather it came in sudden fury, and rebellion, and the heart
of a woman who knew the truth and was ready to accept it, run to it, and grab
hold of it. How often have we looked to the world to tell us who we are, to
wait for their approval or disproval, acceptance or rejection, love or hate?
How often have we allowed the voice of others to lay the fabric of guilt, shame
and sin on us like a blanket that is meant to suffocate us? And if we
internalize that question, how often have we handed down a judgment that wasn’t
ours to make? How often have we spread the sins of others to carry a
conversation forward? How often have we relayed information that breaks people
down rather than builds them up? And how often have WE laid the blanket of
guilt or shame upon someone as we continue to apply a label or identity by words
or actions? Gossip does that and we are not justified in that because we
“shared” it, or “added it to the prayer list”. Hard stop.
Whatever the case, no matter your faults, your
sins, your iniquities, your past, your bloodline, you are a new creation in
Christ. When you accepted Christ, your entire being was purchased for a heavy
price, a very heavy price. Your heart was made new, and God identified you with
HIM, and no one else. And ever since that moment, Satan has tried to rip
the identity from you. He has tried to erase the signature of God on your soul,
doing everything in his power to make you identify with everything that is NOT
of God – because imagine the power you would have if your identity rested ONLY
in the One who created you, and ONLY in the One who saved you, and ONLY in the One
who bought your sin.
Exodus 19:5 | You are treasured by God
I spent a few days in the aftermath of that hurtful text
thinking about the intent behind it. I tossed the idea back and forth between
my hands for days before deciding that I actually didn’t have to have an
opinion on it, at all. It actually didn’t require my anger, my guilt, or
another round of asking for forgiveness. It didn’t require me to hold the
burden like an anchor or drag it around with me like a heavy chain. All I had
to with it was to not identify with
it. And I reminded myself of something I had read years ago about Satan’s
attack strategy on us. Satan wants to keep us in a perpetual cycle of asking
God for forgiveness, as though we don’t accept or receive that forgiveness the
first time. He wants us to believe that we must constantly ask God for forgiveness
as though God would withhold that forgiveness until He feels as though we have
punished ourselves enough. But that is not scriptural nor is it the nature of
our Father.
If we are born again through the sacrifice of Christ, we
have accepted God as our father, admitted that we are guilty of sin, and
told through scripture that our debt of sin was fully paid, then why would we
continue to carry it around? Why would we identify with it?
I ask you today to decide who you are identifying with. Because whatever spirit you are identifying
with will speak through you. It will speak on your behalf and expose the
unhealed wounds in your heart. But more than that, when you identify with
something or someone that isn’t Godly then you will see everything around you,
including yourself, through the lens of that spirit. And if we agree to
identify with the things not of God, then we have rejected the identity of
Christ Himself and His death for us.
John 1:12 | You are a child of God
Imagine the depth of love, grace and mercy you have for your
own children. Imagine the lengths you would go to secure their release from
captivity, to pay their debt from a sin punishable by death, to secure their
identity in love. Imagine how much it would hurt to see them walk away from
that. But also, imagine how heartbreaking it would be to know that your
children only saw themselves through the eyes of their mistakes. If I can
imagine the love I have for my children, how easily I would sacrifice my life
for theirs without a thought, how instantly I would forgive their mistakes
through undiluted love – then I can also imagine how important it would be for
them to live in freedom, grace and forgiveness.
When Jesus bought our sin, He did not tell us to continue to
walk in it. When He purchased our freedom with His life, He did not ask us to
remain in the prison cell of our sin, or defeat, or shame. And when we continue
to identify with that past, that sin, that lie, that brokenness, that “disfigurement”,
that unforgiveness, we take away the holiness of what Christ did for us. We
defy the promises God gave us. And we reject the signature of God on our entire
being. If we rely on our performance, our outward appearance, or our inner unhealed
wounds, then we will always crack and fail in knowing and seeing our true
identity.
Walk in confidence and authority with your new identity. There
will be people you meet that need the redemption in you. And they’ll recognize
you by your freedom, not your prison. They’ll recognize your identity in
Christ, not the world. Be the YOU that Christ purchased, because the people that
God is bringing into your life will need to know your freedom story. And it
will take your true identity to share it.
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