In Christ: Your Life-Defining Identity

How do you send day Crossway to day? Richard Cobb is and living of

Richard, we can give the word from very much. We have seen so

much growth in Richard as he's stepped into his first vocational ministry role here at

Crossway. He's a graduate of the same seminary that I went to, which

is Southern Seminary. And not only have we seen so much growth in Richard

as he has moved into directing the entire Connections ministry here, but we've seen

so much growth that Richard has fostered in others and in our church. He

is a true disciple maker and a mature of people. So thanks for welcoming

Richard Cobb this morning as he brings the word. Hey, thank you sir,

thank you. Hey. What a joy it is to be together today.

Amen. All right, Second service, you guys are already starting out

better than first service, So let's go. Good morning. If you need

a Bible, a bulletin a pen, we have some very kind men and

women who would love to help you out with that. Just raise your hand

and they will get you whatever you need. I guess I shouldn't say whatever

you need, but they will get you either of those three things. I

also want to say, the more lively you are, the more lively I

will be as well. So I would be encouraged greatly by some of that,

Okay, and not for me, but for God's words. So just

don't forget that, all right, don't forget that, amen, thank you.

One of the things that we love to do as a church is sequential

exposition. Right, that's our home, right, that's what we do.

We go through a book of the Bible, one passage at a time,

moving through it, right. And in two weeks Josh will be starting up

the Book of Romans, So get get buckled in because that is going to

be a wild ride and it will be amazing. But every once in a

while it's worth it for us to kind of take one specific look at one

specific topic from a number of texts across the Bible. And while we don't

want to do this all the time, it can serve as as Josh lest

to call it, a very helpful vitamin as we think through and as we

process how we should be thinking through these things. And so what this is

going to require on your part is to turn pages very quickly in your bibles

or swipe very quickly in your ESV apps, or at least write down these

passages so that you later you can go back and take a look at the

verse. We won't be able to cover everything on this topic, but we

want to move our hearts and our lives more and more into alignment with what

God's word says. And today we'll be looking at a foundational issue for every

single person on this planet. And that issue is Hello. My name is

Richard and I am blink. Right. How should I introduce myself that?

How should I identify who I am to you this morning? Should I say

something about my body or my physical appearance? Right? My name is Richard

and I am tall? Who was Richard? And I am a man?

I'm bearded, I am a bear shaped human being. Or I know I'm

the one with hair. Should it be something about my ancestry? Right?

My name is Richard and I'm half Hispanic. I'm one eighth Choctaw Indian.

I am I'm a Californian. Sorry, or I'm the son of Jonathan and

Lilian Cob Should it be something about my personality? Right? My name is

Richard and I am an extrovert. Right. I want to be where the

people are. My name is Richard. I'm not always super punctual at meetings.

I'm a nerd. Right should identify that way? According to my daughters,

I am super weird. Should I talk about my career, my credentials,

and my accolades. My name is Richard, and I graduated high school

with an advanced diploma. I graduated from Southern Seminary. I work here at

cross Way. I'm a small group leader. Or my family relationships. My

name is Richard, and I am Liz's husband. Or I am Izzie and

Olivia's father, or I am Julie's older brother. I'm go on and on

for a long time. Right, There are a lot of things that make

up my identity, just as there are a lot of things that make up

who you are. And the topic of identity is one of the biggest issues

we face today. And maybe after reading recent headlines, you hear that and

you say, amen, I agreed that it is so very important. It's

so easy for us to get up in arms when those people on the other

side of the political aisle from us use identity as a weapon. It seems

like identity is more important today because people feel the freedom to define their own

versions of who they are, even if they just feel this way for a

moment. It's really easy to point to those people and say they're getting it

wrong. That's not where I want to be today. I want us to

see how God talks about who we are, right. The most important thing

for us as Christians is to look at God's word, how he defines us,

and then live out of that reality. I'm not the first one to

see these things, right. They're much smarter men and women who are doing

a whole lot of thinking and writing on this topic right now. The pervasiveness

of identity was pointed out to me a couple of years ago, and I'm

seeing it everywhere now. And by everywhere, I include my own heart,

I include the hearts of the people who I know and love. So insert

your name here. How would you honestly identify yourself this morning? Is it

your marital status? Right, I'm single? Is it a lifelong sin struggle?

I'm addicted to pornography? Is it your ethnicity? I'm black? Is

it your political affiliation I am a Republican. Is it your personality profile?

Right? I am an introvert. My name is blank, and I am

what I want all of us to see and be convinced from all over God's

word that our identity in Christ must be primary, and it must be the

reality that which defines now how we live out it. Christ aim to change

our identities, and we must now live out of that new identity. Yes,

Jesus came and did so much more than that. But if we see

the Gospel and we miss the fact that who we are changes at a fundamental

level, and how we live our lives changes, then we've missed a huge

aspect of what the Gospel is. Our identity is not tied to how we

see ourselves, but how God sees us. We're going to do that in

three points today, and the first point we're going to start by looking at

the heart of identity, and the second point we're going to look at living

out of the root of other identities. And then finally we will look at

our new life defining identity in Christ. But before we do that, let's

pray God. We need your help this morning. I need your help to

speak. I can't change hearts. I can't change my own heart. We

need you to change our hearts. We need you to change us through your

word, through the work of your Holy Spirit in our lives. God,

would we listen not for man's words, but for how you see us,

how you define us, and then live accordingly. Amen. All right,

Step one, We'll begin by first taking a deeper look at the heart of

identity, the heart of identity. And when I say the word heart,

I'm thinking of the biblical understanding of that word in the Bible, when when

it speaks of the heart, it's not often talking about our physical hearts,

that the pump blood throughout our system. Most of the time it's talking about

something else. And I think we understand this right when there's a movie that

the best friend of the main character always tells them, listen to your heart.

And while this exist, this isn't exactly biblical advice, sorry to anyone

else who loves classic Disney cartoons, they definitely understand that a lot more than

just the blood pumper inside of our bodies. Proverbs four twenty to twenty three

says this, my son, be attentive to my words. Incline your ear

to my sayings. Let them not escape from your sight. Keep them within

your heart, for they are life to those who find them, and healing

to all their flesh Verse twenty three. Keep your heart with all vigilance,

for from it flows the springs of life. Author Paul tripp says Scripture presents

the heart as the seat of our emotion, motivation, will, thought,

and desire. The heart is the causal center of your personhood. This means

that people do what they do because of what's in their heart. And and

this can be a good thing or this can be a bad thing. If

we have a heart that's been changed by God, good things will come from

him. But if we don't have that heart, that's going to show two.

Jesus shows this in Luke sixty three and forty five when he says,

for no good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good

fruit. First forty five. The good person, out of the good treasure

of his heart, produces good, and the evil person, out of his

evil treasures, produces evil. For out of the abundance of the heart,

the mouth speaks in this verse, there's a clear line drawn from the type

of fruit that is produced to the type of tree that is there. When

I was growing up in the in the Bay Area, we had a name

who had an avocado tree. And do you know how we knew it was

an avocado tree. You guys are allowed to say this grew avocados. Yea,

it only ever grew avocados. It was not a citrus tree. There

were never lemons and oranges and apples that came off it. It was just

avocados because we could see that it bore avocado fruit. We then moved a

few years later and had a tree in our backyard that had there was a

lime tree. How did we know it was a lime tree? Grew limes?

You guys are so good at this. Yes, absolutely, it grew

limes. Never once did we get an avocado from our lime tree. And

Jesus says that if we want to look at someone's heart, we look at

what they do. We look at their actions and what kind of speech overflows

from their mouth. Our hearts are the control center for what we say we

do. We think an even all the way down to our motivations. So

we do what we do because we want what we want. I don't know

who said that quote first, but it's true. We want things all the

time, and every single time we do, we will do the thing that

we want the most in that moment within our human limitation. Let me give

you just one example. Right, Let's say it's a Tuesday evening, I'm

leaving the office. I call it my wife, and I want to talk

about dinner. If my controlling desire, and that's what we're talking about here,

the thing that controls our actions. If my controlling desire is for convenience,

and I'm gonna call up Liz and I'm gonna say, hey, I'm

just gonna pick something up on the way home, you know, you don't

even need to worry about dinner. We'll just beat out. If my controlling

desire is to save money, I want to pick up the phone and have

a conversation with my wife. And if she's like, hey, can you

pick something up, I'm gonna be like, actually, we went to hib

this weekend, drop like two hundred bucks on groceries, so we're gonna eat

at home today. If what controls my desire is to serve my wife,

I'm gonna pick up the phone and she's gonna be like, Babe, I'm

exhausted. I'm gonna be like, hey, I get it. Let me

stop by HGB, pick up a couple of stakes, and then let me

grill you don't even need to worry about it. Or if my controlling desire

is to choose the path of least resistance, I will answer the phone exhausted

and say those three little words, whatever you want. And that's just four

options about one dinner, depending on what my heart wants most in that moment.

And that doesn't even take in a consideration that my wife is living out

of desires as well. There are things that she wants most in that moment

and in each In every case, I will do what I desire the most,

even if it's for what I only want the most for that one minute,

for that one moment. Right. Do I study for that test on

Friday? Do I hang out with my friends? That sounds a lot a

lot more fun. Do I order a salad? Or do I get that

bacon cheeseburger it looks so good. Do I welcome in someone new if I

see them in the lobby? Or Man, I'm hanging out with my friends.

This is just a lot more comfortable. Do I sleep in or do

I spend time in God's word? After setting my alarm and waking up earlier

than I would want to wake up. We make thousands of little decisions every

day, and each and every one of them is birthed out of our hearts.

Now, why am I talking about the hearts so much when I was

going to be talking about identity, Because I think that the two are actually

intertwined. Our hearts are being controlled by something, Right, They're not just

an impartial jury that are just looking at the facts. Now, our hearts

are being directed by something, and whatever directs our hearts will be determinative to

how we live our lives. Right, how I see myself, my understanding

of where I find my primary identity, well, I'm going to live out

of that identity. The decisions I make will be based out of that identity.

It'll be the grid through which I see all the questions that I have

in life. Going back to my opening illustration of how I would describe myself,

every single description that I said about myself is true, Right, every

single one of those is about me or has impacted me at some point in

my life, but not all at the same level. Right. There is

a hierarchy to our identities. They're not all created equal. Right, Some

of them don't influence us at all, and some of them weigh very heavily

on who we are. Does my achievement of receiving an advanced diploma in high

school matter a lot today when I'm making a decision as compared to my relationship

with my wife, my wonderful wife, is no way the fact that I

even got that events diploma that was very important seventeen years ago when I got

it, that was very important to high school Richard. But today, honestly,

I forgot I even had it until I was coming up with this illustration,

because it doesn't matter at all, unlike my relationship with my wife,

who is the greatest human influence on who I am, although Seth probably comes

in a close second, it's probably Seth right, But with who I am,

my relationship with my wife is up near the top. Graduated with an

evance diploma, nothing, it means nothing to me, has no impact on

my identity today. And for you, it could be anything, right.

It could be that you're an introvert and you're living out of that identity and

the decisions you make are primarily because you're seeing yourself through that aspect of your

identity, of that aspect of your personality, or the fact that you're very

political, and that is what gets you out of bed in the morning.

That is what drives how you live your life. Your hope is very invested

in this next election. Or maybe it's what comes out of the overflow of

your mouth. What are the things that you talk about when given the opportunity?

Where do you go when you have an opportunity to say something? Right?

What comes out of the mouth flows from the heart. Now, why

do I say all this? It's because we all live out of our perceived

identities, whether it's an identity that we have chosen or someone else has given

us. We live our lives based on who we believe we are, and

the choices we make are based on who or what we believe ourselves to be.

We tell our hearts what to treasure, right, We tell our hearts

what decisions to make all the time seeing how our identity controls our hearts.

It's the first point for us this morning, right. How we see ourselves

is key to understanding why we make the decisions that we do. The next

thing that we'll look at is going to be this point number two. It's

how we got this way. It's the root of other identities. I want

to clarify that not all other identities are inherently sinful, right, it's not

wrong. But when these other identities become our controlling identity, that's where we

start to live disordered life today. There are a lot of options for how

this can go wrong, but they all go back to Genesis three. So

would you turn in your bibles with me. There it's right at the front

of your Bible. Most of you already know the story, but but don't

stop listening. I want you to see it, maybe from a different perspective.

And we need to start at the beginning for a couple of reasons.

First of all, because this is where God says who we are. It's

God who gives identity and definition to everything. Before there was anything, there

was God, and he took nothing and out of his infinite creativity. We

read in Genesis one created the universe and everything in it and then includes man,

includes mankind. Then in Genesis two we see the author kind of zoom

in and take a special look at his relationship with humans, which was unique

among creation. Though he had made everything, he had a special relationship with

Adam and with Eve. I'm just gonna run through chapter two and show you

how Adam's identity was tied to his relationship to God. God made Adam Genesis

chapter two, Verse seven. God gave him a place to live, Verse

eight. God gave him food. Verse nine. God gave him a job.

Verse fifteen. God gave him instructions and rules to live under Verse sixteen

and seventeen. God gave him lowercase authority, a lowercase a authority under God's

authority verse nineteen and twenty. And then God handcrafted a woman, Eve,

just for him Verses twenty to twenty one. Adam was not a self made

man by any means. Adam's complete identity was defined by God. There's completely

wrapped up in his relationship with God. And this is exactly how it was

meant to be. This is how it's supposed to be. Yes, there

were other identities that were true for Adam. Right, he was a man,

he was a human being. He was given the job of being the

namer of the animals, and he was a husband. But what drove his

decision making was his relationship with God and Eve. Though we see most of

the story focusing on Adam, Eve was in the same perfect relationship with God.

Everything was as it should be, everything was good. Then we get

to Genesis chapter three, and we have the introduction of one of these new

identities for the first time as a controlling option. Let's look at this conversation

in Genesis three, verses one to six. I'm going to start at verses

one to three. Then he Satan said to the woman, did God actually

say you shall not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman

said to the serpent, we may eat of the fruit of the trees in

the garden. But God said, you shall not eat of the fruit of

the tree that is in the midst of the garden. Neither shall you touch

it lest you die. So Satan came to Eve and started questioning the authority

and the goodness of God. Then, in verses four and five we're about

to read, we see the first temptation to choose another identity, to choose

a new identity other than how God had to find them Verses four and five.

But the serpent said to the woman, you will not surely die,

for God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened,

and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. Suddenly they

had the opportunity to create their own identity. This was not just, oh,

Eve, look at how pretty the fruit is on that tree. This

was Eve. God made you human, but you can be more. You

can define yourself. You can be like God. God had given the parameters

to live under, end and authority to sit under. And here Satan was

tempting them to create their own. Verse six. So when the woman saw

that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to

the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise,

she took of its fruit and ate, And she also gave some to

her husband, who was with her, and he ate. That moment right

there is where we start to see the breaking down of the good and perfect

identity. This is where Adam and Eve wanted to define who they were and

be sovereign over who they were over their lives. This is when they went

out from being under submission to God and tried to be sovereign over their lives.

This is where they went out from submission, and we're into rebellion,

and this is where every single person born after Adam and Eve are naturally and

First Corinthians fifteen twenty two, Paul says that in Adam all die, and

in Romans five twelve. And I don't want to spend a long time here

because we're about to hop into Romans. But in Romans five twelve it says,

just as sin came into the world through one man, that's Adam,

and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.

This is the state that we are all born into by our nature.

Now what controls our heart isn't being in a right relationship with God by nature?

Now we are separated from God and our living disordered lives by our nature.

Now we do not live out of the right identity. And this is

the legacy left for us in Adam. And this is what happens when we

try to live out of an identity that is disconnected from God's right. We

have a laundry list of secondary identities, right, I'd listed off twenty or

so at the beginning of the sermon. Those identities are again not sinful or

wrong inherently. But if we live out of those as our primary identity,

if we make those the things that ultimately define us and the decisions that we

make, then we'll be living disordered lives with disordered priorities. Turned to turn

to Philippians, three. If you're sitting here this morning and your primary identity

is in anything else, I beg you to listen to the words of Paul.

In this passage, in verses four to six, he goes through what

is actually a very impressive list of other secondary identities. He was circumcised on

the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin,

a Hebrew of Hebrews, a pharisee, a persecutor of the church, and

a righteousness under the law blameless. Those things mean little to us. They

would have been some very impressive credentials if Paul believed that someone could have been

saved apart from Jesus Christ, Paul saying, that would have been me.

I'm very impressive, and yet read verses seven to nine. Paul says,

but whatever gain I had, whatever again I had from those things, I

counted as loss. Why for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count

everything is lost because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ, Jesus my Lord.

For his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things and count

them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ verse nine, and be

found in him. Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the

law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God

that depends on faith. Friends, no other identity will save you, No

other identity can make you right with God. If you're sitting here this morning

and living under any other identity, living out of any other identity, or

trusting in anything else to save you, recognize that it is all worth nothing,

and that at the end of your life, when you stand before the

throne of God, all those identities are nothing to anyone who finds our primary

identity anywhere else other than in Christ. God will say, depart from me.

I never knew you. But if you have repented and turned from your

sin and said I repent to my sin, and I trust in the good

and saving work of Jesus on my behalf, then God will welcome you in

and say well done, good and faithful servant, and identity will be eternal.

Don't make the wrong decision a new identity in Christ staring at it.

That's that's actually going to be our third point. I love it. We've

looked at the connection between our hearts and our identity. We've we've looked at

where it all went wrong and out point three. Your new life defining identity

in Christ. Your new life defining identity in Christ. Now, I'm gonna

We're just gonna take a moment to bask in just the huge list of what

God says comes with our new identity. I'm gonna warn you, I'm gonna

be rattling off a lot of passages, and if you're not a quick writer,

don't worry about it. I'll include it in the email tomorrow morning.

But this is how God sees us. Now, this is our new identity

in Christ. We are Roman six five to nine, united to Christ in

his death and resurrection Roman six eleven, dead to sin, but alive to

God in Christ. Jesus Roman six twenty three, given the free gift of

eternal life in Christ Jesus Romans eight one, not under the threat of condemnation

for those who are in Christ Jesus Romans eight two. We are set free

from the law of sin and death. First Corinthians one four. We are

recipients the grace given to us in Jesus Christ. First Corinthians fifteen twenty two.

We are made alive in Christ. Seven Corinthians one five. We're sharing

in Christ sufferings and comfort seven Corinthians five nineteen. We are ambassadors for God

Galatians three twenty six. We are made sons of God Ephesians one three.

Were blessed with every spiritual blessing, including being chosen in Him, holy and

lamless before Him, predestined and adopted, were deemed and forgiven of all of

our trespasses Ephesians two ten. We are God's workmanship, created four good works

Phesians four three two. We're forgiven by God Philippians one one. We are

made saints, and Philippians four seven we are given the peace of God.

Identity is not just all over the world out there identity, Our new identity

in Christ is all over God's word, and praise God that it is.

And this is just a small fraction of the over eighty times Paul uses the

phrase in Christ. That doesn't include all the variations of what that can look

like. And just a second, we'll be diving into a couple of these

implications. But I wanted to start out by making sure that we don't miss

the most important thing here. The sermons largely about implications for our identity.

It's not some list of rules we ascribe to or it's not some unknown god

that we make offerings to. Know we have entered into a relationship with Jesus

Christ. I don't know if it's still a thing right, but your Facebook

relationship status would say united to Christ. Jesus Christ, who is fully God,

took on a new identity himself and actually added to his full divinity,

full humanity when he came to this earth to save us from our sins.

And when he did this, he exchanged his perfect righteousness for our sins and

for us. This means we're not just talking about a change of clothing.

We're talking about a change of who we are at the foundational level. We're

talking about a change of eternal destiny. Because of this new relationship and this

new identity. The only reason we get our new identity is because he took

on a new identity first. The only reason we get a new identity is

because he took our old one on himself and gave us his perfect righteousness.

Listen, or turned to Second Corinthians five fourteen to seventeen, for the love

of Christ controls us. Because we have concluded this that one has died for

all, and therefore all have died, and he died for all that those

who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who for their

sake died and was raised. From now on, therefore we regard no one

according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh,

we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ,

he is a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold,

the new has come. Living out of that identity in Christ means that our

old, the old identities that we used to live out of the old priorities

we had died with him. We now live a new life which is alive

to Christ. Whoever you were before drops down the list of identities to live

out of. You are a new creation. But sometimes it can get a

little challenging to actually live out of what we know to be true. It

takes a time. It takes a long time sometimes for our instincts for our

new identities to fully kick in and catch up with what is true. Right.

I was just having a conversation with with Aaron Rosco recently, who was

He'll be celebrating his first anniversary with his wife later this week. Mazel Tov

but he he was telling me that it was only recently that his brain now

defaults to being a married man. Right, So like now, instead of

just working until whenever he wants, picks up the phone and says, hey,

babe, sorry, working a little late, which is great, or

Aaron, just go home. Right, you've got a new wife. You

can go home. That's fine, don't worry. Actually I got you.

So even his identity, though it changed a year ago, he's only just

now seeing actually living out of this right, didn't happen overnight, aspects of

it did. But he's finally catching up with his new identity. And this

happens us all the time. Right, we get a new job, we

move cities, get a new roommate, get we move up a grade,

something like that. Right, there are a thousand different ways that we know

something to be true. It takes a while for us to catch up with

them. As glorious as our new life in Christ is, there's plenty of

pull to still live out of that old identity, to live out of those

lesser identities. We are all, at some points and in some ways all

guilty of living out of the wrong identity. Let me give you two ways

two of the more common places that we need to switch from living out of

who we used to be and who into our new identities in christ Number one,

we live out of our freedom from sin, not our record of it.

We live out of our freedom from sin, not our record of it.

For this one, we're going to be in First Corinthian six. This

example of living out of our record of sin is one that we see all

over the place, and in fact the most common twelve step program. You

begin every time by saying my name is blank, and I am an alcoholic.

Right is an identity. I don't want to minimize a control that things

like drugs, alcohol, sex, pornography, and money can have over the

human heart. Right. Sometimes it even changes us physiologically, because we have

given ourselves to it that much. And God takes life defining sin very seriously.

Whatever it may be, it's big enough that it could keep us from

a relationship with him. Listen to some of the identities of those who were

now Christians at the Church and corinth In First Corinthians six, nine to ten.

They had been marked by the sins of sexual immorality, idolatry, adultery,

men who practice homosexuality, thieves, greedy, drunkards, revilers, and

swindlers. Pause there, this isn't even an exhaustive list, right, There

are many lists in the Bible that talk about who we used to be,

what our hearts can be consumed by. But this declaration here isn't the most

important in this passage. No, the next verses. Listen to the words

that Paul wrote to the Corinthians verse eleven and such were some of you.

Oh snap, already we see that this is in the past tense, right,

such were some of you, as in not anymore? And then one

of the most beautiful words shows up. But whatever it was there before,

this isn't the end of the story. Verse eleven and such were some of

you. But you were washed, washed, as in your sins were cleansed

by the blood of Jesus, erasing your guilt and shame. What else does

he say next? You were sanctified, right, this is positional sanctification.

Or you died to the power of sin and were made alive to Jesus Christ.

You were made a child of God. Back to verse eleven. You

were justified. That is, you've been declared righteous by God because you now

stand with the Holiness of Christ, adorning you, and how did all this

happen? And of the verse in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ,

and by the Spirit of our God, for the Child of God, for

the believer who has been united to Christ. What's great about this passage is

that it has already happened. This isn't something that we need to try to

muster up the strength to do. This is something that has already been done

on our behalf. You don't need to do anything. It's already been accomplished.

And don't forget who wrote down this verse. This was Paul, who

was literally in the process of capturing and killing Christians when God changed him,

when God saved him from who he was, gave him a new identity,

and now Paul's living out of it. This is Paul's story, this is

your story, is my story, This is everybody in this room story.

So why do we then still let our sins define who we are. I

think we're giving our sins way more credit than they deserve and power than they

actually have. I'm not saying that we can quote a verse and they'll just

go away. Now on this side of heaven, we're going to continue to

struggle against sin every day. We're going to continue to struggle against the pull

that it has on our hearts. But see that the true reality is that,

compared to the power of God, all these sins are powerless. Sin,

though present in our lives, is not our eternal destiny. We have

been washed, we have been justified. We are a new creation. So

let's remind the sin that remains in our lives that it's been paid for and

that its days are numbered. We can sing loudly the words of Yet,

not I but through Christ in me to this I hold my sin has been

defeated Jesus. Now and ever is my plague. How the chains are released,

I can see I am free. Yet not I but through Christ in

me. Number two, we live out of our new unity, not our

old differences. We live out of our new unity, not our old differences.

We're gonna look finally at a Galatians three twenty seven to twenty nine.

Now we do have some real differences, don't we. God intentionally made us

different. Right, He made some of us male, some of us female.

He placed us in certain families, with certain ethnic backgrounds, certain skin

colors, right from different socioeconomic backgrounds and all this was chosen by God uniquely

for us. How we grew up is part of our story, and it's

very relevant to who we are today. Yes, and what God says is

that your new identity in Christ supersedes everything that came before. Our Regulatians three

twenty seven to twenty nine shows assists when it says, for as many of

you as we're baptized into Christ have put on Christ, there is neither Jew

nor Greek. There's neither slave nor free, there's no male and female.

For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's,

then you are Abraham's offspring. Airs according to promise, Paul's not saying that

suddenly all the Christians in Galicia were now homogeneous with their ethnic identity and makeup

right, that there were suddenly no differences. No, no, no,

that's not true. Right, if you go back to the law, there

were big differences between Jews and Gentiles, right, just as our differences between

men and women. But those differences we're not to separate them anymore. This

isn't a magic wand for like for racial harmony, there are still very real

things that we need to work on as a church body. But there's now

unity where none had existed before. What those believers now had in common,

what we now have in common as a church is way more powerful than what

separated us. Being baptized into Christ change their primary identity and now they were

one new family. The world wants to emphasize the differences that we have,

right. We're from different side of the tracks, different skin color, from

different cultures, but in Christ we have a shared identity that should baffle the

world, and we need to see that more more with other members of Crossway.

We need to see that we have more in common with other members,

no matter what they look like, than we do with our family or with

our neighbors. Right, because that is more important that we start recognizing what

unity in Christ means. The bank can come up as we wrap this up.

One of my favorite memories was one I spent a month in the Philippines

working with high school students. And it's not just because I was an anomaly

out there of a tall, bear shaped, curly haired college kid, although

I was a bit of an anomaly. It is because though we didn't grow

up in the same culture, that we didn't even primarily speak the same language,

though I thank God that they actually spoke very fantastic English. We didn't

come from the same culture, the same country, we worshiped the same gods.

I write on that trip that I had brothers and sisters who I had

never met before, but they were more family than my relatives who aren't believers.

This new Church family runs thicker than blood because it was Jesus's blood that

brought us together. We are now changed men and women. We're not who

we were. We are a new creation. We have a new identity in

Christ, and I pray that all of us would see and live out of

this new identity. See how important our heart is to this conversation about about

the decisions that we make, that we would recognize when we're placing too much

emphasis on a secondary identity and rather live like the new creations that we are.

My name is Richard and I am what am? I defined by my

sin, I defined by my status, my job, my religious activities.

May it never be My name is Richard and I am a new creation in

Christ. Who are you? Who does God say you are