Being True to Yourself

 

The Apostle Paul’s conversion in Acts 9 is one of the most prolific in God’s Word. Before his conversion, he was known as Saul and was notorious for persecuting followers of the Way of Christ. Many believers were killed and imprisoned at his directive. Saul was considered a member of the upper echelon of Jewish leadership. He was well-versed in Jewish law and culture, and a very astute and intelligent man by all accounts. He believed himself to be a devoted person of faith, and the ironic thing about Saul is he believed that by persecuting believers of Jesus Christ, he was doing the Will of God. This was exponentially far from the truth.

How can a person be so incredibly wrong and think they are right? Well, the materialism of our day and time has proven how easily we can be deceived, and how quickly we will forfeit the profit of our own spiritual good for the quick and temporary pleasures of the flesh. Most people believe that their identity is defined by how they look and feel. They believe that the things they find enticing to the eyes and senses will add to and aid them, and not subtract from and harm them. This is how many are tricked, and how their true identity in Christ is undermined.

We cannot be authentic in any respect if our authenticity has not been first defined for us. We are created beings, and our Creator, Yahweh, is sovereign. He has no equal and all power rests in His hands. He is the definitive authority on our creation and being. He tells us in Genesis 1:26 that we are made in His image. He is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and He created us to be triune beings as well. We are spirit, soul, and body. The body was not created by God to totally define us but to house us. 1Corinthians 3:16 tells us that the body is the temple of God. It is where His Spirit dwells, and it is this earth-suit, made by God from the dust of the ground, that allows our spirits to abide on this planet. Without the body—the earth suit, we must return to the place from which we came.

This is not to say that the body is not important. Truly it is, because we could not be ‘human’ without it, but the thing that causes the body to function optimally, in the way God designed it, is our discipline to fortify our human spirit and human soul through God’s Word. We live in a society where dysfunction and social ills are rampant, but this isn’t God’s desire. He wants us living abundantly and blessed in every area of our lives. Our problem is that we have allowed the world to set the standard for how we should define ourselves. The world’s standard dictates that our external or exterior defines us. If we are aesthetically pleasing according to what society defines as beauty, then we are accepted, and in many cases, we are elevated on the basis on nothing more than the way our earth-suit looks. This judging a person’s worth and value by how they look is the root of many social ills like sadness, insecurity, and low self-esteem.

Heavenly Father doesn’t want us to experience these conditions. He wants to help us, and an important piece of the help He offers is our acceptance of our true identity, the one He has given us through Jesus Christ. Ephesians 2:10(NLT) declares, “For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” Romans 8:29(NLT) tells us, “For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.” Our very beginning was a thought in our Creator’s mind. He knew us long before we ever entered our mother’s wombs. We didn’t chose God first, He chose us first. And He chose us and marked us out to be transformed through our earth experience into a replica of His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ is God’s only begotten Son, and he is our big brother. He’s the firstborn and we’re his siblings. He was so thrilled to have us as part of God’s family, and he loved us so much than he laid down his life for our redemption and salvation. Romans 8:35 tells us that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, and Romans 8:37 declares that overwhelming victory belongs to us because of Christ. This is the tremendous and victorious reality that the devil has tried to keep us from knowing, so we can continue to be enslaved by him and trapped by the world’s superficially and greed.

The psalmist said in Psalm 31:15(NKJV), “My times are in Your hand.” Being true to yourself is knowing the truth and walking in that truth. The reality is that we are created beings, and we are utterly and completely dependent on God. Our very lives and the air we breathe are gifts from Him, and He alone has defined the purpose, reason, and fulfillment of our existence. If we step outside the parameters of His truth to attempt to understand ourselves, we will be sorely disappointed, lost in vain philosophies of worldliness, and perhaps more miserable than we were before we started.

We cannot define ourselves or plan for ourselves apart from the sovereignty of our God; for outside of God, there is no life. Only in Christ can life be found. That burning need to be more, to express greater life, to live it more fully than we have in the past, this all comes from Him. MORE is God’s specialty, and it begins with honoring His plan for our lives in Christ. 2Corinthians 1:21-22(NLT) tells us, “21 It is God who enables us, along with you, to stand firm for Christ. He has commissioned us, 22 and he has identified us as his own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees everything he has promised us.” We must seek to know God through the Spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit, that lives within us. Jesus Christ is Lord! And he must have this place of authority and Lordship in our lives. As we allow him to lead, guide, and direct us through his Spirit, we will realize we are not self-made, but God made, and the truth of our identity in Christ is more glorious than anything the world can offer. ■ 

Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

“Being True to Yourself”, written for Christian Encouragement and Inspiration© 2021. All rights reserved. All praise and honor to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.