For you have died, and your life is hidden in union with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life as manifested, you will also be manifested with Him in glory. Colossians 3:3 – 4
If you are a Christian, then your independent self died on the cross with Christ. Your individual self still exists, for you will never lose your unique personhood, but that new person in union with Christ finds its identity in the reality that Christ is now our life. That’s what makes your new person (new creation) different from what you were as an independent self. We are partakers of the divine nature, for we have become the righteousness of God in Christ, and therefore the nature of Jesus is now your new nature, and all that Jesus is and all that Jesus has defines your capacity. You now have His capacity for joy and laughter, His capacity to love and forgive, to experience compassion, hope, and His capacity to celebrate life and to bring the offer of healing and deliverance into every environment you step into. This gospel, this Christian life, is so much bigger than anything we could ever imagine. This kingdom, this Narnia is so much more magical than any writer could ever fantasize. One with Christ plunged into His story, and He, one with us, plunged into our story so that it becomes one glorious story that He lives through us. Truly, how great a salvation. The independent, fallen, false hideous self is gone, and the new self I am is one with the risen Victor. The Overcomer is my life, and I never have to feel overcome or overwhelmed again, for nothing is overwhelming to Him. Gloriously I no longer have the right, nor would I ever want that right again, to think what I want to think and to want what I want to want to desire what I want to desire, and to long for what I want to long for, for I now get to think what He thinks, want what He wants, to desire what He desires, and long the what He longs for. Truly when Christ, who is our life, is allowed to reveal Himself through us, we are revealed with Him in glory, not just one day in the sweet by-and-by on streets of gold, but today in the here and now where the rubber meets the road.