Soulfood

Nancy Guthrie

How do we introduce ourselves to the world? What do we want people to know about us? What does it show about my identity?

When we are in Christ our identity is continually changing and being remade after the image of God in Christ Jesus. We who are united to Christ are becoming like Jesus, and this is our ultimate and guiding identity!

Genesis 1:26 being made in God’s image means we are “to have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the livestock and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (Foreshadowing – Adam was to subdue rebellion by other creatures including creeping things…FAILED)

Male and female God made them. And they were made to image God and radiate His glory, exercising dominion on His behalf over His good creation. But the image of God became marred and corrupted by their rebellion. Adam failed to affirm what God had said and instead joined Eve in listening to another voice. But he had a promise from God that their offspring would crush the serpent’s head, accomplishing what Adam had failed to do.

Genesis 5 Adam fathered a son in his likeness, the son of God.

Exodus is the next time we hear about a Son of God – it is the nation of Israel whose identity is in the image of God, a people called by His name. Exodus 19:3-6 – their identity is rooted in the saving grace of God. They were not to make images of God, but they were to be God’s image in the world.

But the people made an image of a calf, and like a calf they became stiff-necked. We become like what we worship and admire. Whom am I looking at? Whom am I admiring? Whose voice controls mine? Do my influences point me to Christ or somewhere else? How is my identity being shaped by the people and things I am fascinated by and attending to?

So the Israelites stopped being One-God people saved by grace, but instead looked at worthless idols. They doomscrolled the social media feeds of the idolatrous nations around them and their thinking became polluted. They became an image of not-God.

And then…God gave them His radiant glory and the exact imprint of His image in the person of Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God. Colossians 1:15ff Jesus is the renewed and remade Adam who does all that Adam was supposed to do – and he is also the offspring who crushed the head of the rebellion-inciting creeping serpent!

And when Jesus was resurrected he was still human but his glorified body did not look like his body before. Jesus was the first glorified human but he is not the one and only – he is bringing many sons to glory! Romans 8:29 he is conforming us to the image of himself.

What is our identity? Known. Predestined. Conformed. Justified. Glorified!

Colossians 3 we are being remade after the image of Christ, thinking the thoughts he thinks and doing the deeds he did and talking like he talked. When we look at Jesus, we are looking at God. Our union with Christ is conforming us to the image of God. As we set our minds on things above we lose concern for worldly things (idols).

Christ is not something we add to our lives – he IS our life. Our identity is in Christ. Our self-image looks like Jesus. The Spirit is working to make us completely into the image of Christ. As we look to him we become radiant. We will be pure as he is pure. We will be wise as he is wise. Glory hallelujah!

Who am I? I am wrapped in Christ. I can be fully myself but not full of myself. My source of identity is not in myself but in Christ. My sense of worth is inseparable from God’s love for me. I am a redeemed, righteous, royal resident of heaven.