Who are you? What do you think of yourself? Do you see and judge yourself according to your actions, flaws, abilities (or disabilities), intentions, qualifications or lack thereof? Or do you see yourself the way God sees you? Your life is going in accordance with your dominant beliefs and especially your dominant beliefs about yourself (Proverbs 23:7).
“So then, from now on, we have a new perspective that refuses to evaluate people (and ourselves) merely by their outward appearances. For that’s how we once viewed the Anointed One, but no longer do we see him with limited human insight.”
2 Corinthians 5:16 The Passion Translation (TPT) – brackets mine
As a believer, you have so much in you! The power of God lives in you! Seeing yourself according to limited human insight will limit you and prevent you from walking in all that God has for you. Faith isn’t just believing right but it’s responding in an appropriate way to God because you believe right. Your appropriate response to God will include how you see yourself and what you say about yourself. In other words, part of faith is to see yourself the way God sees you, and it takes faith to do that! If you’re only evaluating yourself according to your outward appearance then you’ll either be deceived into thinking you’re awesome in and of yourself, and that would be pride. Or you will be deceived into thinking that you’re terrible and you’ll start condemning yourself, and that would also be pride because you’re valuing your evaluation and opinion of yourself above God’s.
“Now, if anyone is enfolded into Christ, he has become an entirely new creation. All that is related to the old order has vanished. Behold, everything is fresh and new.”
2 Corinthians 5:17 The Passion Translation (TPT)
The very moment that you say “yes” to Jesus and receive salvation you became an entirely new creation. Through your union with Christ you were not “made better” but rather you were made completely new! Your old sinner-identity vanished, and you were made completely new – now you are the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21). The Christian life is not an opportunity to try again or try harder, rather it is a whole new life. The Christian-life is not a continuation of the old sinner-life; you are not a “sinner saved by grace” – you were a sinner but you got saved by grace, and now you are a completely new person all because you are in Christ.
You aren’t a new creation because you live holy! You’re a new creation because you said “yes” to Jesus and saying “yes” to Jesus made you holy (Hebrews 10:10). Living holy doesn’t make you a new creation (or a Christian) but becoming a new creation (a Christian) will cause you to start living holy. Holiness is the fruit of salvation, not the root of it!
What makes it difficult for us to accept that we are new creations – holy and righteous in God’s eyes, is that we evaluate ourselves according to our outward appearance, not our spirits. All humans are spirit-beings who have souls (mind, will, intellect, emotions) and live in a body (1 Thessalonians 5:23). When you receive Jesus, your body doesn’t automatically change and neither does your soul. You don’t all of a sudden lose excess weight and know everything you need to know! Your spirit is the part of you that becomes just like Jesus and is now perfectly holy and righteous. Your spirit is the part of you that is saved. Now, you need to work out your salvation from your spirit into your soul and body (Philippians 2:12). The more you see who you are in your spirit, the more you will start to feel it (soul) and experience it in your actions (body).
It’s time for you to unleash what God has put inside you. Start by choosing to see yourself as God sees you.