Are You in Adam or in Christ? - who are you

Who are you? I am a carpenter; I am the father of four children, I am a single mom just trying to make it in this crazy world. I am a failure; I am a freak; I am an alcoholic; I am rich; I am the carefree sort; I am depressed. We tend to define ourselves by the things we do, the people with which we associate (I am a Republican), the things we are dealing with, or the things that have happened to us. The truth is that “I” am not my job, my job is what “I” do. “I” am not a failure, although I may have failed at some things in the past. So “I” am not the things I do, I am not the things I have been given, I am not the things that have happened to me, I am not other peoples’ expectation or definition of me. I am not my failures or successes… and the list goes on. I am not the external events and influences of my life.

There is something else going on in here that is not just the sum and effects of the externals of my life. Our perception of who we are can be strongly influenced by the conditions and experience of our lives. No doubt about that. For instance, if a child is told that they are stupid, of little value, and that they will never amount to anything, they may very well believe that about themselves. Inside, there may be a great capacity for solving problems and issues plaguing our society, but if the false image is not caste down, the potential will never develop. Their life could be compared to the potential of that in a peach seed. The germ and life of the tree is buried deep within the hard impermeable shell. If the shell is not broken, there will never be all that delicious fruit, season after season, and no shade to comfort someone on a hot July afternoon, no exquisite silhouette against the full moon in December. It is this believing something other than the truth that has the potential of humanity locked up, fearful, living within the walls of our own perceptions, deceptions, and defenses.