The Greatest Freedom You’ll Ever Know
It’s hard to put into words what gaining security through getting to know who I am in Christ has done for me, but I have found that as I’ve learned the promises in the Bible that tell me who I am and what I have in Christ and live out my true identity on a daily basis, God is giving me the ability to articulate this more clearly. I’m so thankful to God for this.
At the same time, I fully realize that I have so much more to learn and that doesn’t bother me at all. In fact, it’s exciting to me. You’ll find this to be true as well in your own life. We’re all on this journey together!
So let’s see who we are and what we have…in Christ, by Christ and through Christ Jesus! And remember, these are only a small amount of all the promises found in the Bible on our true identity in Him. The treasure hunt never has to end as we take time to study God’s Word!
We Are New – Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. (2 Corinthians 5:17 – NASB)
We Are Free From Condemnation – Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:1 – NASB)
We Are Destined For Good Works – For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10 – NASB)
We Are Chosen, Royal, Holy and God’s Own Possession – But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. (1 Peter 2:9 – NASB)
We Are The Righteousness of God in Christ – He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5:21 – NASB)
We Are Sons And Daughters Of God – For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26 – NLT)
We Are Christ’s Ambassadors – So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, Come back to God! (2 Corinthians 5:20 – NLT)
We Are Full Of Peace – Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. (Romans 5:1 – NLT)
We Are Partakers Of The Divine Nature – 1 Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ – To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3 seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 4 For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. (2 Peter 1:1-4 – NASB)
Something wonderful is gonna happen to you as you live your life knowing: “Wow, In Christ I’m brand new, I’m free from condemnation, I’m destined to do good works, I’m chosen, royal, holy and I belong to God. I have right standing with God – apart from my works, I am a child of God, I’m an ambassador for Christ and God is going to make His appeal to people through me during my lifetime. In Christ I’m filled with peace, I’m a partaker of God’s nature and His divine power has granted to me everything pertaining to life and godliness.”
Here’s what will happen: When you start understanding you are new, you’ll also start living out of your new identity in Christ. Your new right belief system will naturally lead you to do stuff like what Peter encourages here in this next groups of verses.
In 2 Peter 1:5-9 Peter said,
5 In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone. 8 The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
9 But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.
I promise you, living out this Christian life is absolutely doable when it’s lived through Christ Jesus. You will find yourself changing more and more into the image of Christ as you focus, not on what you must do, but as you behold Him. (see 2 Corinthians 3:18 ). The doing will come. There is no doubt about that because right believing leads to right living, which leads me to my next point.
The reason the right doing (right behavior) did not come on a consistent basis for me for so many years was because I didn’t know who I truly was in Christ so I was all caught up in changing myself by my own effort instead of receiving the changes that come from a life submitted to Jesus!
And by the way, I think it is extremely interesting that in this group of verses that you just read above in 2 Peter chapter 1, it says in verse 9, “But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.”
See here, these are the people that are living their lives trying so desperately to be spiritual, but they are constantly buried under a mountain of condemnation because they do not know or they are not fully accepting and honoring the truth that Jesus has already taken care of their sins, once for all time. (see Hebrews 10).
Believe me, there is no hope for any kind of real spiritual productivity for the people who will not accept God’s complete forgiveness for themselves. How do I know this? Because I used to be this person, constantly trying to pay my own way instead of just receiving the gift of Jesus’ finished work.
Since I was, for the most part, disregarding what Jesus did for me and instead, depending on myself, I wasn’t able to receive the power on a daily basis that comes along with placing our trust in and receiving His finished work in our lives.
Let me be clear, I was taught many of these things growing up, but my own legalism had me totally blinded. I did not see grace. I saw everything as law. Every verse I read in the Bible I saw as another rule to follow instead of a promise from a heavenly Father Who loved me.
I didn’t know (I didn’t truly understand) this good news for so many years because legalism blocked me from getting a heart-shaping revelation on these Biblical promises. Ahhhhhh… but now I know and this revelation in my heart is getting deeper and deeper every day and the devil doesn’t know what in the world he’s gonna do with me anymore and he’s not gonna know what to do with you either, once you get this solid, solid, solid in your heart!
You see, before I understood grace the way I do now – not as a doctrine, not as a theology, not as one subject along with a list of other subjects, but as the person, Jesus Christ:
I didn’t know I was new, so I didn’t live like I was new and in fact tried to spend all my time being something I already was (which was new), but I didn’t know it so it didn’t do me any good. (referring back to 2 Corinthians 5:17)
I didn’t know I was free from condemnation, so I didn’t live like I was. I felt bad about myself almost 100% of the time, unless I was performing perfectly. (Referring back to Romans 8:1)
I didn’t know I was already destined to good works. Oh my goodness, if I had known this… the boatloads of stress it would have saved me from trying to be good enough. (Referring back to Ephesians 2:10)
I didn’t know I was chosen, royal, holy and that I belonged to God; as in He was never going to leave me and He was not mad at me, but was crazy in love with me. Chosen, Royal, Holy, God’s own – each of these words carries such power that you can just imagine what they produce in us when we really believe they are true of us! (Referring back to 1 Peter 2:9)
I didn’t know that I was a daughter of God. I saw myself as His servant and therefore I acted like one. For more on this I recommend John Sheasby’s wonderful book titled The Birthright. (Referring back to Galatians 3:26)
I actually did know that I was an ambassador for Christ, but I tried to be this in my own strength; therefore, witnessing about Jesus was a chore for me. But not anymore, my friend. Now I can’t wait to get out my doors and shine for Him because it’s all by His grace paving the way for me to shine! God sets me in the right place at the right time and He will do the same for you, if you believe He will. In fact, my girls and I are going to be doing errands all day today and I am SO excited to see who God has lined up for us to encourage! (Referring back to 2 corinthians 5:20)
I didn’t know that I had been made right with God through faith which was totally ridiculous because this is one of the things I heard my parents talk about more than anything – “We are the righteous of God in Christ,” they would say. But the devil had me blinded. I heard everything as law. I heard it as, “I gotta be, I gotta be, I gotta be righteous by doing good works.” I didn’t hear “You are righteous in Christ alone” because of the legalism I was under. Since I didn’t know that my right standing with God was secure, my life was not filled with peace. (Referring back to 2 Corinthians 5:21 and Romans 5:1)
I didn’t know I was a partaker of God’s divine nature. I thought I had to earn my way. (Referring back to 2 Peter 1:1-4)
Again, I cannot even begin to fully explain the deep impact that knowing who I am in Christ has made in my life. I want to see this transformation happen in every Christian’s life!
I see the benefit of this all throughout the day and not a day goes by that I don’t think things like – “Wow, that’s changed in me… I’m not fearful in that area anymore… I just left that conversation and didn’t second-guess myself… I wasn’t nervous around that person, but instead felt totally free to be me… I didn’t feel the need to impress so and so…I didn’t feel one ounce of condemnation over that sin…I was able to focus on Jesus’ ability in me instead of my inability in this situation…Cool, I ran right back to God’s love for me instead of accepting that fear just now…I’m not feeling stressed to try, try, try; even though I have way too many things to do today. I prefer to place my trust in Christ…
And I could go on and on if I sat here long enough thinking about how God has transformed my life by transforming my believing.
I hope and pray that I have been able, by the grace of God, to leave you with a hunger to have the greatest freedom you’ll ever know! It starts with accepting Jesus as your Savior which you can do by clicking the link below. Then, the result of you placing your trust in Christ by receiving His gift of salvation is just what I’ve been talking about in this blog post. It’s the good life of being completely secure in who you are in Christ!
I could have never imagined what knowing who I am in Christ was going to bring into my life. It’s changed everything…and I mean EVERYTHING!
If you have not yet made Jesus your Savior and received the wonderful joy that His finished work on the cross has provided for you to live in, please visit my page here titled Jesus In The Driver’s Seat. On this page I explain the good news of the gospel and you will have the opportunity to pray a prayer of salvation, making Jesus your Savior! Jesus loves you and His arms are wide open!
Sandra McCollom
