Jesus did not just die to pay for our sins. He died to crucify the fallen and broken old self. We seem to live in a time where many Christians want to identify themselves by their brokenness instead of identifying themselves with who they are in union with Christ. If left alone to try to live for Christ out of a sincere heart, will the brokenness of the flesh manifest itself? Of course, because Jesus said apart from Him, we can do nothing, even if it’s trying to live a godly life. The good news is we have been hidden in union with Christ, and therefore we are never apart from Him, and therefore we never need to live as if we were. True humility and authenticity are never defined by how much we own and talk about our brokenness. Humility and Christian authenticity is always defined by how much we talk about Jesus’s adequacy. Any conversation that we carry on that accentuates the weaknesses and brokenness of an “apart from Christ” humanness is just a sophisticated and religious version of self-centeredness. You should never think about yourself without a consciousness of the new self that you are hidden in Christ. God never does, so why should you? He believes in the truth about you, and the truth about you is that you have been included in who Jesus, and in the life that Jesus lives.
