by Paul David Tripp
The LORD is my light and my salvation.
Psalm 27:1

A plague has infected the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. It’s a sad disease. It’s left us weakened and broken and discouraged and afraid. It’s almost like as soon as you come to faith in Jesus Christ, you get infected. And it robs you of your spiritual vitality. It robs you of your joy. It robs you of the rest that Jesus died for you to have. It reduces you to timidity and doubt and worry and dark addictions of all kinds. It somehow, someway, gets us all. The problem is that most people don’t know they have it. They actually live with the delusion that they’re healthy when everything in their life points to the fact that they’re sick.
What is this disease, you ask? It’s “identity amnesia.” We have forgotten who we are. And in forgetting who we are, we frantically look for identity in thousands of places where it will never be found, places where you were never meant to look for identity. You probably do it so instinctively, so frequently, and so naturally that you don’t actually know you’re doing it. You’re so used to carrying the burden that you don’t know you’re carrying the burden anymore. You’re spiritual back has hurt you for so long, you’ve forgotten that you’re in pain.
Now, I say this all the time and I’m going to continue to say it, because I think it’s important to say: you are in a constant conversation with yourself. No one’s more influential in your life than you are, because no one talks to you more than you do. And a principal part of that conversation is this conversation of identity. You’re constantly saying things to you about you. You are always assigning to yourself some kind of identity. And the identity you assign to yourself will somehow, someway, set the course for how you deal with literally everything in your life. You never escape the identity you assign to yourself, ever. It’s always forming the way you’re interacting, even with the most mundane things in your existence.

Thought to Remember for Today

As you begin to consider your true identity in Christ, you can rest in the reality that the Lord is with you, working to reveal His work in and to you, and that even though you may struggle, He has promised to complete His work.

Fitzpatrick, E. (2016). Grace untamed: a 60-day devotional. Colorado Springs, CO: David C Cook.