This past weekend, I was attending seminar and the one entire day was spent talking about ministering healing to those who have parts. An extreme case would be Multiple Personality Disorder(MPD) or Disassociative Identity Disorder(DID). There are several signs of someone who has disassociated and has “parts”. One of them, I remember seeing very clearly when I was ministering to a young woman. It’s the ability to speak, with absolute conviction, 2 opposing beliefs. And, it got me to thinking…..and wondering…..if it’s possible to have spiritual DID. Why? Well, it seems we get quite good at speaking, with absolute conviction, 2 opposing beliefs.
“I am a sinner.” and “I am in Christ.” So….exactly how can one be in Christ and be a sinner? Christ cannot co-exist with sin. 2 opposing beliefs about who I am.
“We are all going to sin. We can’t help it. It’s inevitable.” and “The death of Christ gives us power over sin.” Ummmm…..we can’t help it? and we have been given power over it? 2 opposing beliefs about our ability to conquer sin.
In reality, it all stems from an identity crisis. We are not completely certain who we are. When we resolve our identity crisis, and decide once and for all who we are, we find true victory. Suppose there is a young man who has a gender identity issue. He is biologically male, but feels himself to be a female. He has struggled with this all his life. Daily, he is confronted physically that he is indeed a male. His mind recognizes this but, at the same time, he is feeling things that would seem to say he is female. “What am I?” he asks, “Male? Or, female?” The moment he chooses to be one or the other, it allows the will to act upon that belief. He now has permission to act the gender he has chosen. If the female gender has won the battle of his mind….he will probably become either homosexual, bi-sexual or transgender. But, if he decides he is indeed male despite what he feels, he will begin to act and associate as a male….and it opens up the possibility-probability even-that he will one day begin to feel male and see himself as male.
So, back to our spiritual DID. The Bible is replete with verses that tell us that our identity is in Christ; that in Christ we move and breathe and have our being; that it is actually Christ who lives in us. Now, Christ cannot sin. So, if I am in Christ, how can I also be a sinner?
Now, can I-do I sin? Yes. But….I bake, but I’m not a baker. I sing….but wouldn’t call myself a singer. I swim….but that doesn’t make me a swimmer. Now, Michael Phelps would say he is a swimmer….not me, no matter how much I love swimming. What I do occasionally does not become my identity.
There are some who say it’s simply a question of semantics, but is it? When we believe ourselves to be sinners, we give our will the permission to act as a sinner. We don’t necessarily want to….but we expect no different. When we believe ourselves to be in Christ, our will more readily assumes the actions of Christ. And, sin becomes the antithesis of who I am.
Now, the next one: am I helpless against sin? Or do I have power over sin? If we resolve the identity issue, it will take care of this question. But, let’s look at it. It is, after all, part of our DID(no pun intended). Now, there are several verses that is often quoted to show that we are indeed helpless against sin. Romans 7:18-23
For I know that in me(that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one that wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity of sin which is in my members.
This is(I think, but not totally certain) the only verse that suggests that we are helpless against sin. But, Paul is not talking about a believer. He is, I believe, using a literary device that speaks of something that is in the past as if it were a present reality. We all do it: we are telling a story or talking of something and we say something like, “And, there I am standing there…. I tell her everything I need…..” and we describe a past event as if it were present.
How can Paul be saying that sinning is inevitable when he just spent the previous chapter telling us that we are dead to sin?
How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? v. 2
It’s obvious that this is a rhetorical question. He is not actually asking us how we can do that.
Verses 4-6 then tell how we have been baptized into Christ’s death, buried with Him, united in the likeness of His death,
…knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin. For he who has died has been freed from sin.“ v. 6-7
Verses 9-10 explain how He died only once….it’s not something that needs to be done every day. And, then tells us in the same way
reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” v.11
“Reckon” also means to “count” or “consider”. I remember one bible teacher talking of how Southerners say, “I reckon so.” meaning, “Yeah, that’s they way it is.”
Sin shall not have dominion over you. v. 14
And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. v. 18
As long as we believe we are powerless and helpless against sin….that we are sinners doing by nature what sinners do, we will never find victory in Christ. And we nullify the work of the cross. We are basically saying that nothing happened inside of me…..there was no true change. We must allow our true identity to win the identity struggle. I refuse to say or believe that I am a sinner. I am NOT a sinner. I’m a dead man walking…..Christ living in me. I am not a slave to sin! I am a slave to righteousness. Does my experience or my feelings testify to that? No. There are times I feel very much like a sinner. I feel completely powerless against sin. But, just like a man choosing to be female doesn’t make him female….feeling like a sinner doesn’t make me one. Feeling powerless against sin doesn’t mean I am! What I feel myself to be is not who I am.