My Best Me

When God formed you in His image, when He shaped you into an entirely unique representation of Himself, He made you unlike anyone else. God breathed life into you as He did Adam He made you a living being through His Spirit (Gen. 2:7). The word breath and spirit are the same in Hebrew, to say God gave man the breath of life and he became a living being is to say God gave man the spirit of life and thus man lives. Just like when Jesus breathed into His disciples and told them to receive the Spirit (John 20:22).

“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” (Col. 1:15-18).

All things were made through, by, and for Jesus, and He is the one that holds them all together. In Him we live and move and have our very being (Acts 17:28). If that is true, how can we separate ourselves from God? God and His creation are inseparable. So what does this mean about the way we live?

How can we set this time aside for God and that time aside for ourselves if we are connected with God at a subatomic level? I used to believe that when I chose to do something outside the will of God that it was my decision and it would only hurt me; I make the choices and I will deal with the consequences. But it’s not really like that. If God’s presence is continual, how can I bring God into my sin? This is why Paul said that when we sleep with a prostitute it’s like joining Christ with that prostitute (1 Cor. 6:15).

The way that I’m living right now, is God happy with me dragging Him into it? This is why sin is so disgusting to God. Not only did God not create us to be dragged into sin, He never intended us to try to drag Him along with us. God can sever that inseparable tie, we can quench His Spirit (1 Thes. 5:19), God’s Spirit will not struggle with man’s forever (Gen. 6:3), we can experience spiritual death, and be eternally separated from God in Hell (2 Thes. 1:9). So then, how can I live in God’s presence? How can I get rid of the sin?

Usually when we talk about sin, we addresses it as the problem, but I don’t believe that is entirely correct. The sins we often commit, our addictions, our habits, our dysfunctions are really only symptoms of the real problem. Violent acts that we commit come from our anger and our anger usually comes from our own deep hurts and pains. Now, we can address our behavior, learn to control our anger so that we don’t allow it to force us into an action that we will regret, but this doesn’t take away the anger, it only helps us control the outcome of our anger. If we don’t deal with our anger, we will end up finding another outlet for it. If we deal with our anger but never face our hurts and pains, we will find another way to cope with them. We may choose drugs or alcohol, and those may be sinful habits, but the true problem is still the hurts that lead us to these habits. Sexual acts that we commit come from our lusts, and our lusts usually come from deep feeling that something is lacking. Perhaps we were never loved as we needed to be, or maybe we lack confidence and use sex to boost our ego. We can stop having sex but not address our lusts and end up finding another way to get what we need. We can even address our lusts, but if we never deal with the feelings that something is lacking, we will end up using something else to fill the void.

What we really need to do to remove the sin, the hurt, the void, and anything that would keep us from experiencing the full joy of God’s presence and being the person He created us to be is take a deep look inside our selves at where the problem really lies. To get to the heart of the problem we have to look deep inside ourselves and ask, why are these unhealthy things so appealing to us? We have to ask ourselves, why are we going to our sinful habits to find relief? Why am I making the same mistake Adam and Eve made?

Instead of going to God with their desires, Adam and Eve went to the forbidden tree, the listened to Satan, and they tried to be the answer to their own problem. I don’t have to keep doing the same. I can turn to God, submit to His will, put myself in the hands of the potter who shaped me in the first place, and let Him shape me back into the true me.

This is not about me becoming what anyone else says I should be (that’s how this whole thing began – Gen 3:5), this is not about me becoming someone else, this is about me becoming the best and truest me. Christ didn’t come to change everything, but to reconcile everything. That means to end the conflict and put things back the way they belong. Look at Colossians chapter one again.

“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

“Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation— if you continue in your faith, established and firm, and do not move from the hope held out in the gospel...” (Col. 1:15-23).

It’s time to stop trying to be someone else, and start dealing with the hurts and pains that lead us into sin. God never wanted this for you, instead He wants you to partake in His divine nature and escape the corruption caused by evil desires (2 Peter 1:4). He wants to be one with you!

Put those pains, hurts, and labels to death. Come to Christ and be born again, be a new creature, be the you that you were made to be, that no one else can be. It’s not just about losing yourself, it’s about finding yourself and being truly free.