I Am … Who and What God Says I Am! – The Divine Reckoning of the Renewed Mind, Part 20

I Am … A New Creation

Therefore, if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things have become new (II Corinthians 5:17).

I am a new creature. This is who and what Father says that I am.

The New Me in Christ

God has made me who I am as a part of His new creation. Any attempt at knowing who I really am must start here. So, who am I, really?  I am a new creature in Christ. I have been “created in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:10).

Many struggle in their Christian walk to find deliverance from “themselves.” Even those who have come to understand that they are new creatures in the Lord Jesus Christ often believe that they are really still their old selves, too. They have been led to believe that there are somehow two of themselves.

They have been taught that there are two selves residing inside of them. They have been led to believe that they are always fighting an inward civil war for control – fighting to live, fighting to gain control, fighting for supremacy, fighting to have the dominant expression. Remarkably, this is all some strange type of religious schizophrenia. It is a tiresome and burdensome struggle of the imagination. What is so sad is that nothing could be farther from the truth.

The Former Me in Adam

Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin (Romans 6:6).

Many believers’ lives are lived from the grave – from the defeated dominion of the “old man” – from the former independent, Adamic-self that was finished on the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Through my union in Christ’s death and resurrection, my old self-life in Adam is history; I rest on this accomplished fact. There are many believers who are trying desperately to crucify themselves, when it already is a done deal. My crucifixion is a historical fact. I refuse to live under the domination of the old Adamic-life.

One Me

There is only one me. I am a new creature. I am one person, not two. I am not two creatures; I am a one “new creature” – a totally new creation of God.

… Old things are passed away …

My former self, my old identity in Adam, the old me is dead and gone. It has “passed away.” It died with Christ. It is not who I am anymore – regardless of what I may think or do to the contrary!

… Behold, all things have become new.

One Nature

I do not have two natures. I had an old one that used to be. I have a new one that now is. The battle is not an inward struggle between two “me’s.”

Not that there’s not a battle. It is just that it’s a battle of faith. The battle is about believing what God says is now true about me. It centers in me believing that I am who and what God says I am.

Many are seeking to be liberated from themselves. They think that they are in the midst of a great battle between their two selves – their two natures. This is not what the Scriptures teach!

Paul clearly writes that we,

… WERE by nature the children of wrath … (Ephesians 2:3).

A new nature has not been added to my old one. This would only be confusion, and God is not the author of that (I Corinthians 14:33). What I was by nature in Adam is in the past.

Christ once-and-for-all dealt with my former self at the cross. He has now made me a new self – “partakers of the divine nature” (II Peter 1:4).

I am not now liberated from my old self. Rather, I am now liberated to be my new self. I am now free to be who I really am; the real me – the only me that there is – the new creature that God has made me in Christ.

One Life

I have been crucified with Christ: nevertheless, I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, Who loved me, and gave Himself for me (Galatians 2:20).

My former identity – my old “I” – was my identity as the son of Adam.  My new identity – my new “I” – is my identity as a glorious son of God.

My old “I” is that of molded conformity – of human uniformity. As a son of Adam I was from birth ever pressed into the cast of sameness.

My former “I” is just that – it was crucified (executed) with Christ – “I have been crucified with Christ …”

My new “I” is just that – new – brand new. It is the “I” of Christ living me. It is the new “life which I NOW live in the flesh …” My new life is HIS life. It is the only life I now have.

One Identity

I do not have two identities. I had an old one, but now I have a new one – one former, one present.

My new identity – the new “I” – is that of unique design – of divine distinctiveness. As a son of God I am now free to be that one-of-a-kind individual that God has created me to be – filled and made vibrant with His dynamic life living in and through me.

I [ a son of Adam] have been crucified with Christ: nevertheless I [a son of God] live; yet not I [the “I’ of the old creation ], but Christ lives in me [the me of the new creation]: and the life [the divine life of God] which I [the unique person God that has made me to be] now live in the flesh [right now, this very day], I live by the faith of the Son of God, Who loved me, and gave Himself for me (Galatians 2:20).

The Realization of My Liberated Self

People are always talking about their attempts to discover their true selves – their efforts of trying to “find themselves.” The believer in the Lord Jesus Christ needs to find out who they really are. All that is needed is a careful look at the Scriptures, and a simple faith in the words of who and what God says that I am. God knows who I am; all I need to do is believe Him.

The new me is the me of union with Christ. It is His life. It is His life exchanged for my past one. It is the great exchange. Indeed it is the greatest of all exchanges – the truth of the divinely exchanged life.

Understanding and believing these glorious truths will allow me the freedom to be at rest with my new self – free to be the real me, the new man, the only me that there is – the me in Christ.

I refuse to be the shell of a person, pushed into a mold of Adamic conformity. I will be the real me that God uniquely designed me to be. I refuse to be bullied out of my divinely designed identity that Father has given me.

I am who and what Father says I am.

I am a new creation.

Clyde L. Pilkington, Jr.
Bible Student’s Notebook
© 2010