This is Part 1 in a four-part series on “Identity” leading up to our 2025 Conference on the same topic. For more info and registration details, click Here.
Throughout the years, I have found that most of my counselling cases, if not all, eventually touch on one topic: personal identity. While the presenting issues may vary, my counselees struggled to answer one question lingering in their hearts constantly: “Who am I?” Although the secular world has come up with relevant concepts (i.e., identity crisis) to explain this phenomenon, it never succeeds in providing a satisfying answer to this fundamental, ontological search for who we are.
Where the secular world fails, the followers of Christ can provide a true and distinctive answer to this question about who we are by considering biblical insights about personal identity. Through the series of articles, I would like to address the biblical understanding of personal identity and how it can be applied to the context of counselling ministry. As we begin this series, let us compare the secular understanding of personal identity (i.e., worldly identity) and the Christian understanding of personal identity (i.e., Christian identity).[1]
Worldly Definition and Characteristics
The Cambridge Dictionary defines identity as “who a person is, or the qualities of a person or group that make them different from others.”[2] As this definition implies, identity is an individual’s answer to the question: “Who am I?” Every person endeavours to give a distinctive yet reasonable answer to this question that satisfies both oneself and others.
The three characteristics must be considered in the study of personal identity. First, identity is used to distinguish self from others—often used to prove one’s uniqueness and worth compared to others. An individual’s identity is established through social interaction. Kevin Vanhoozer describes the interpersonal nature of identity formation: “The human creature is neither an autonomous individual nor an anonymous unit that has been assimilated into some collectivity, but rather a particular person who achieves a concrete identity in relation to others. Human being is inherently social.”[3] Because personal identity is inherently social, both individual and communal factors should be considered in counselling someone who struggles with an identity issue.
Second, both intrinsic and extrinsic factors influence one’s identity formation. Intrinsic characteristics, such as gender, race, and disability, have an impact on one’s identity. At the same time, extrinsic factors, such as marital status, occupation, level of education, and religion, also effect one’s identity. It is important to note that these intrinsic and extrinsic factors do not work separately but conjointly. For example, different combinations of gender and occupation may result in a different role in the workplace or job opportunities.
Third, identity is not a static but a fluid concept. In other words, personal identity constantly changes as people experience life change. Changes such as socioeconomic status, relationships with others, and physical health. While a life change usually precedes an identity change, people do not always ascribe their identity to life change.
Because a personal identity can change throughout one’s lifetime, establishing an unwavering foundation of identity is significant in counselling people struggling with their identity.
Christian Identity: Definition and Characteristics Compared to Worldly Identity
In contrast to worldly identity, Christian identity can be defined as identity in Christ. In other words, how God sees a believer through the person and redemptive work of Jesus Christ. It is the Creator’s authoritative answer to a believer’s deepest question of, “who am I?”[4] Because Christian identity is a divinely proclaimed reality, it supersedes all the other identities and identity markers that a person or a group may have.[5] This also means that Christ’s followers are more than their race, social status, gender, and nationality since their new identity in Christ supersedes all the worldly markers of identity.
First, Christian identity shifts one’s focus from inward to outward: it redirects a believer’s purpose of life from serving oneself to serving God and others. This dramatic change is only possible because of Christ’s redemptive work for sinners, as the knowledge of the gospel and faith in Christ lead believers to self-sacrifice. The apostle Paul describes the nature of this fundamental change in the book of Ephesians: “For by grace you have been saved through faith. … For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph 2:8a, 10). This passage clearly shows an indicative-imperative nature of Christian identity: because a believer is God’s “workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works,” he or she now ought to live for God and others. While worldly identity defines who a person is according to self or others, Christian identity defines who a person is according to the Creator. While worldly identity keeps people focused on worldly things, Christian identity drives believers’ focus toward heavenly things.
Second, Christian identity enables and equips believers to evaluate all intrinsic and extrinsic factors in their lives through the lens of God’s Word. According to Brian Rosner, “The Bible judges the standard markers of human identity (race, gender, occupation, and so on) to be inadequate foundations upon which to build our lives” because these factors are “insecure and not designed to bear too much weight.”3 Establishing one’s identity upon these standard markers is like building a house on the sand: when the rain falls, the floods come, and the wind blows and beats against the house of identity, it will fall. The only unshakable foundation of identity is found within the Word of God. The house of personal identity built upon what God says in his Word will not fall “because it had been founded on the rock” (Matt 7:25b).
Third and finally, Christian identity is strengthened as a believer’s relationship with God deepens. While constant changes of personal identity due to life changes can cause confusion and identity crises, a Christian identity rooted deeply in the Word of God grows stronger over time as believers’ divine-human relationship solidifies. Here is the beauty of Christian identity: just as Jesus is the founder and the perfecter of the faith of all believers (Heb 12:2), he serves as the architect who builds and completes the identity of his followers. When built on the foundation of Christ and the hope of the gospel, a Christian’s identity will grow steadily and confidently as they experience deeper communion with God.
Questions
What are some of the identity markers that you adopt to establish your identity? How does each marker influence your identity formation?
How does your identity in Christ enable or compel you to reinterpret your understanding of personal identity or identity markers?
[1] This series is modified excerpts from my Th.M. thesis, “Strangers and Exiles: Christian Identity as the Foundation for Counseling Korean Americans”. The full text is available at: https://repository.sbts.edu/handle/10392/6417.
[2] Cambridge Dictionary, “Meaning of Identity in English,” accessed June 10, 2020, https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/identity.
[3] Kevin Vanhoozer, “Human Being, Individual and Social,” in The Cambridge Companion to Christian Doctrine, ed. Colin E. Gunton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 174-5.
[4] Here are some of Scripture’s answers about who a Christian is in the Son of God: a new creation (2 Cor 5:17), God’s workmanship (Eph 2:10), a child of God (John 1:12; Gal 3:26), a fellow heir with Christ (Rom 8:17), a chosen race (1 Pet 2:9), the righteousness of God (2 Cor 5:21), the branch (John 15:5), a friend of Jesus (John 15:15), a temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 6:19), a citizen of heaven (Phil 3:20), a member of the body of Christ (1 Cor 12:27), and the list goes on.
[5] One of the Scripture passages that support its superiority over worldly identity is Galatians 3:28. In this verse, the apostle Paul argues that there is no room for division or discrimination among Christians, such as Jew or Gentile, slave or free, and male or female because all Christians are “one in Christ Jesus.”
Jeemin Moon is a native of South Korea and is Director of Biblical Care & Counselling Studies at Heritage College & Seminary. He is pursuing a PhD in Biblical Counselling at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary under the supervision of Dr. Jeremy Pierre. Jeemin holds a BA in Counselling Psychology a BA in English (Handong Global University, Pohang, Korea), an MDiv in Worship Leadership, and a ThM in Biblical Counselling (both at SBTS). He also serves as a music ministry director at Grace Bible Church in Cambridge, ON
