Repent of Your False Identity, Embrace Your Real One

So the question is: who must I understand myself to be in order to take up this task? The doctrine of transformation — and transformation is the outflow of changing your identity. So your identity is at the foundation. Transformation, to become the kind of person able to take up the task of Christian restoration, Christian rebuilding, Christian reconstruction — it starts with the doctrine of transformation.

Before we can talk about what we are called to do, we need to establish how a man changes. Because we can all admit that to a greater or lesser extent, we are not the people we should be, because we do not really have it fully internalised in our hearts who we actually are. The project of reconstruction does not begin with a programme — it begins in the mind. We need to be transformed in our identity.

The Doctrine of Metanoia

How does that start? It starts with the mind. This is the Christian doctrine. We cannot just say: be good, be better, and somehow you work up a head of steam in your heart and get all excited. No. The end is good, but there is always not just an end but a way, and the way is changing your mind.

Now, there is a word in the Bible, in the Greek New Testament, to do with changing your mind. Luke 15:7 says: more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents — and the word repents there is metanoia. Luke 2:4: God’s kindness leads you to repentance — metanoia again. Acts 11:18: God has granted the Gentiles repentance — metanoia — that leads to life.

So this whole business of change, change of identity, starts with the mind. It is what the Bible calls metanoia. Not the heart, not even the will — the mind.

Now, we say repentance, and very often in the church it has become like a domesticated word. Instead of being a wolf, it is a chihuahua. We have domesticated it into something like: I feel sorry for my sin. But actually, this whole repentance business is a radical word. It is not just I feel sorry. It is a mind word. Meta — which means beyond, after, or above. Noia — mind, thoughts, or understanding. It is a complete change of mind, not just a feeling of guilt. It is a fundamental reorientation of how a man thinks about God, himself, the world, the task of reconstruction, and what we are here for.

So when we repent, we come to Christ initially and we realise: God is God, I am a creature, I have sinned, I accept that I have sinned, I change my opinion of myself and of God and so on. But in the process of sanctification, that change must be ongoing, and it is a complete revolution. A continuing revolution.

We have used this verse: do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That word transformed is metamorpho — same as metamorphosis. This is the kind of radical change that changing your mind means scripturally. It is not a little tiny change here, a tweak there. It is not a cosmetic adjustment. It is the kind of change that leaves nothing of the old form visible in the new.

We think of a butterfly. How much caterpillar does a butterfly have in it? Percentage-wise, you look at a butterfly and think: ah, definitely that used to be a caterpillar. Well, there is no caterpillar in a butterfly. It is somehow the same creature, but it is so radically transformed that there is nothing of the old form visible in the new.

Is this transformation a really strong feeling in the heart that you get when you sing choruses? Well, we love godly songs, but the location of biblical change is in the mind. Ephesians 4:22-24 gives us three stages. Put off concerning your former conduct, the old man. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind. That is the second part. Then, third: put on the new man, which was created according to God in true righteousness and holiness.

There is a putting off of the old man and a putting on of the new man. And what is in the middle? Going to church more? Getting really fired up at a conference? No — the renewing of the spirit of your mind. This tells us that the renewing of our mind is not just the destination — it is the necessary mechanism by which the old man is stripped away and the new man is put on. You cannot skip this step and say: I am going to stop sinning, I am going to stop being lazy, I am going to stop having a bad attitude. No. There is a way to do it, and the way is being renewed in the spirit of your mind.

Proverbs 23:7: as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. What a man genuinely believes — not just what he professes, but what he actually assumes to be true about reality — will determine everything he does.

The Master Lie: Dualism

There is a wider thing, apart from individual sins that people might commit, and that is a master lie that inhibits the reformation of the mind. This lie says that there is a divide, a big wall, between the secular on one hand and the sacred on the other. The secular is politics, economics, how you plant things in the ground, how you eat, how you drink. The sacred is going to church on Sundays and saying your prayers as a devotion.

Because that master lie has been handed to people and they have accepted it and never challenged it, there is a big block in their minds to having a sanctified mind. Stephen Perks calls this a dualistic dereliction. And it is sad, because people are just handed this as part of their formation as Christians by sitting in the pews. It is an abdication of the comprehensive lordship of Christ.

You might discover that you have a room in the house, or maybe just a cupboard in the kitchen, where you say: do not open that, God is not allowed in there. Okay, I love singing hymns, I love the scriptures, but this particular part — I am not so sure. That is autonomy. That is dualism. And sadly, this is the identity which has been handed to many Christians — that Christianity is a matter of heart feeling.

Three True Identities

Let us look at three aspects of true identity that will transform our idea of who we are, allowing us to do this task of Christian reconstruction.

The first is the new Adam. Everything is grounded in 1 Corinthians 15:45-50: “The first man, Adam, was made a living soul. The last Adam was made a quickening spirit.” So the first Adam, the second Adam — this is crucial. We cannot think of ourselves as in any way being of the world, of the first Adam who rebelled, who accepted the proposition from Satan that we can question God’s word and become God’s essentially by rebelling.

What did the first Adam do but reject the whole plan of Christian reconstruction — that is, dominion — and say: no, I am not going to submit to this work any longer. I am going to cast off that burden and I am going to choose to be a God and do my own thing. So we cannot engage in the Christian work of reconstruction without embracing our image as being in Christ, the second Adam.

The Christian man is not merely forgiven of his sins — which he is, which is crucial. He is enrolled in the new humanity. And because we are enrolled in the new humanity, we have that task uniquely of taking dominion in this world — the task which the first Adam sloughed off. Christ picks it up in his person, and we in him have to pick up our particular responsibility.

When it talks about the image of God, we have gone through this before — the first mention of the image of God in man is to do with dominion. So we cannot separate this identity. When we say we are in Christ, it is not just: we are forgiven, we are redeemed, we are going to heaven. We are re-established in our task. And that task is not just a responsibility — it is the free expression of our nature. Our nature is now to take dominion. If we suppress that dominion in Christ, we twist ourselves and twist our nature.

Regeneration is not the finish line. It is the starting pistol.

The second identity is dominion man. From Genesis 1 to the Great Commission, there is a consistent calling for the Christian man to be God’s steward over the earth. And that is not a passive thing — it is active, and it is conquering. We should remember that the word subdue means literally in the Hebrew to tramp down. There is new territory — literally new fields which are uncultivated — and you are to tramp out. That is part of this dominion mandate.

Whatever we do, we do it as a stewardship. Luke 19:13 says: occupy till I come. Occupy means trading, doing business, active engagement in the world. The very opposite of huddling together in the church waiting for the rapture.

The third identity is self-government. The fundamental unit of government is not the state — it is the individual man under God’s law. That is the basic unit. Why is the nation in trouble? Because it is filled with people, even filled with Christians sadly, who are not governed by God’s law. Proverbs 1:7: the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Self-government is a prerequisite for family government. If you are not a man who can govern himself, you will never be able to make enough money to support a household. And family government in turn is a prerequisite for wider cultural influence. 1 Timothy 3:4-5: the man who cannot rule his own heart and household — how can he then govern?

Three False Identities to Set Aside

By contrast, there are also three identities to set aside.

The first is autonomy. Auto — self. Nomos — law. It is the idea that you can determine what is good and evil for yourself. You are not under God. You are not saying every word of God is truth. You are saying: I want to do this, I want to do that, regardless of what God says. Maybe you have a line in your mind — God can be in the living room of my house, in the kitchen, he can go up the stairs, but he cannot go into that room. There is a part of my life that is mine. That is autonomy.

The second false identity is pietism. Now, piety is good — pietas means a rightly ordered loyalty in religion, family, and public life. But pietism is a master lie. It says the realm of Christianity is one room in the house, the good room with all the doilies and fancy lamps. The rest of the house — well, that is mine to deal with. What I do in the kitchen is my business. This is a docetism. Docetism — from the Greek doikein, to seem, to appear — was a doctrine that taught that Christ only appeared to have a physical body. And if we say our heart belongs to Jesus but deny him our hands and feet and mouths and all the things we do in the world, then we too are guilty of a kind of docetism. We think Christ can live in the heart as a spirit without being incarnated in our actual lives.

The third false identity is defeatist man. Now, if you do not believe you can win — if you are certain that you are going to lose — would you not be a fool to try? Would you not be an absolute dum-dum to try something if you were convinced it would never work? And so if you are told that you are going to lose, that your destiny, your identity, is to lose on earth but win in heaven — especially if that has been told to you by Christian conference speakers, Christian authors, from the pulpit, again and again and again — you would be mad to attempt anything.

The man who is shaped by, for example, rapture thinking — it is only with the coming of Christ that the kingdom comes on earth, and even the amillennialist idea that the kingdom never comes in history, there is only decline and then the end of time — how much are you going to pour into this earth if you think it is all going to be burnt up? Whereas we believe that the world is not going to be burnt up, but be transformed into the new heavens and the renewed earth.

William Carey said: expect great things from God, attempt great things for God. He was only able to attempt so much — learning languages, moving to another country, pioneering a mission — because he had an expectation. If you have the expectation of defeat, you will never attempt anything. But if you have the expectation of victory — then Jenny bar the door, let us go, all systems go.

The Mind Can Be a Prison or a Launchpad

The mind can be a prison. The mind can be like manacles on your wrists and chains on your ankles. And this is why it is such a responsibility to teach God’s Word. A pastor who year after year, thinking they are orthodox, says: this world will never have any real impact, it is not our business to be engaged in the dominion mandate, there is no victory for us until Christ comes again — it is worse than manacling somebody. At least you can work for your physical freedom. But if you are enslaved in the mind, there is nothing you can do.

That is how important it is for you to grasp, at a deep level, that there is not just hope — there is certainty that Christ will win. And furthermore, because of that, there is a certainty that your labour in the Lord is not in vain. It is not a question mark. It is an absolute certainty. If you sow, you will reap.

So in conclusion, back to the identity question. The goal is a settled confidence that Christ’s kingdom advances in history and that our labour is not in vain. Regeneration is the starting pistol, not the finish line. You are the new Adam, in Christ. You are a dominion man. You are a self-governed man. And none of those three identities can be taken from you, because God spoke them into you before you were ever born.