Identity theft in this digital age has become so rampant that companies like "Lifelock" have become a household name. From email accounts to bank accounts there is gauntlet of passwords and user names to master so that no hacker can steal your identity and ultimately your money. While certainly this issue of identity theft among the saints would be worth exploring, I would like to explore an identity theft that has been going on since Eden. This identity theft has not been a struggle to steal Adam or our identities, well in part yes, but the chief theft is theos, that of God and who He is. Satan in Garden of Eden tried to steal God's identity and misrepresent Him by saying, "Did God really say you may not eat nor touch the fruit of this forbidden tree?" (Genesis 3:3). The devil had added "touch" something the Lord God had never said, "You shall not eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil." (Genesis 2:16-17). Why did the diablo add this extra claim? It was to distort who God is, to make Him out to being so controlling to Adam and Eve, that He won't let you even touch the fruit. Sound familiar? Don't touch!
The Identity Theft of the Trinity has been ongoing by the Thief who not only seeks to kill, steal, and destroy us, but also to kill the love for God in us, steal God's identity and mask it with a bitter contemptible cruel God, and to destroy our relationship with the Almighty. If the Evil One can convince a person the Lord is this overlord demanding perfection, and administering punishment on a whim, then Satan has effectively made the Word of God into a Sword of God bearing over every believer to cut them to pieces. Satan's tactics are to make us see God in an improper light. For centuries the Israelites in their wars with pagan tribes had called the Lord their Baal, which means war god, but the Lord responded thus, "In that day-- this is the LORD's declaration-- you will call Me Ishe, "My husband," and no longer call Me, "My Baal." (Hosea 2:16). Ishe as it states means husband and this is crucial, because God is doing two things to restore His identity to the Israelites, firstly He is saying you are my bride not Ashtoreth or Ishtar who is wed to Baal, secondly He was saying I love you as my wife, and I am your husband, the great I AM was saying I am bridegroom and Israel is my bride, which becomes important when Jesus says, "Jesus answered, "How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast." (Matthew 9:15, Jesus was speaking of Himself here). The Truth is that the Trinity wants an intimate and close relationship with us, but Satan who comes from an angelic race bent on status, station (roles, titles, doing), and works constantly steals God's identity and replaces it with a Angry God wanting to crush us for every transgression or who is displeased with us and wants us to perfect ourselves to earn his acceptance.
What I find puzzling with most pastors and churches is the emphasis that we need to pray more, be more vitreous, and to show God we can be trusted, to prove to God we can carry his glory, and to earn a greater station in Heaven or titles and crowns. Is this not the angelic system Satan is obessed with? From what I read in Bible we are already given titles, have earned through Christ alone not only acceptance and eternal life, but much more, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come," (2 Corinthians 5:17), "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you had no identity as a people; now you are God's people. Once you received no mercy; now you have received God's mercy," (1 Peter 2:9-10), "for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith," (Galatians 3:26),"and He raised us up together and seated us together in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus," (Ephesians 2:6), "Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!," (1 Corinthians 6:3), "And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you," (Romans 10:10-11),"but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us," (Romans 5:8), "You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit--fruit that will last--and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you," (John 15:16), "Now if we are children, then we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory," (Romans 8:17), and, "What shall we say about such wonderful things as these? If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself. Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us. Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:31-39). None of these verses include our merit or earning these titles and abilities, but rather they are free gifts through God who is Christ, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--Salvation is not a reward for the good things/works we have done, so none of us can boast about it," (Ephesians 2:8-9), "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit," (1 Peter 3:18), "so also Christ died once for all time as a sacrifice to take away the sins of many people. He will come again, not to deal with our sins, but to bring salvation to all who are eagerly waiting for him," (Hebrews 9:28), "But now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation-," (Colossians 1:22), and, "God made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God," (2 Corinthians 5:21). If we believe the Scriptures, then we are already holy, blameless, and perfect through Jesus Christ alone. You can read that we are either on perfecting and purifying treadmill tell the Second Coming of Christ (typical understanding of pastors and scholars) or you see it this way, you are purified and all you are responsible for is knowing (relating, loving, connecting) with Christ (Matthew 22), sharing the gospel (Matthew 28:18-20), and continuing to believe until Christ returns (Romans 10:9-10 + Matthew 24:10) . None of those are about perfecting or purify, but relating to God, sharing this relationship with others so they will have it in eternity, and finally continuing relationship tell you repose or Christ Returns; none of these is focused on perfection or purification, but rather presence with God and with others (Matthew 22:36-40). There is no merit based system in this viewpoint, you don't share gospel to receive a higher level of heaven like Dante saw in the Paradiso, more crowns, or perhaps a position of authority in Millennial Reign (Revelation 20:4-9); but rather you share Gospel so others may know glorious God through a relationship through His Son Jesus Christ. Its a relationship, and this God is loving (1 John 4:8), In fact He is love and so loved the World He sent His Son and He died for us sinners so we would not be separated from Him in this life or in next!
O but Satan will not have you see this Savior, for then you would love Jesus. If you believe what Bible says, that Jesus loves you so much He died for your sins and every separation between you and God (Matthew 27:51, Romans 8:39), if you believe the bible that says you are seated with Jesus (Ephesians 2:6) and have gained all authority, titles, and benefits (inheritance verse) as Co Heir with Christ merely through Christ's actions, then you realized there is nothing to merit, there is just a great and tender loving relationship with God who did it all so you only need ot focus on relating, loving, and growing closer with Him. Satan furious that anyone may walk and talk with God as Adam did () thus puts up a poser, a mimic Messiah, and false Christ who wants you to work yourself to the bone and break your soul on Sacraments, penance, and works to prove you deserve love or to earn even a small chance to be in presence of God, when in Truth the Apostle Paul tells us, "God lives in you," (1 Corinthians 3;16 Paraphrase) and "Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault." (Colossians 1:22 NLT). If the devil cannot stop a person from becoming a disciple of Christ, he will then steal God's identity and depict the Lord to his followers via their minds, emotions, and through people to be a cruel taskmaster, a never satisfied parent, and demanding everything with nothing in return or little in return. The devil is so successful at stealing God's identity beause the saints help Him, they won't just receive the Free Gift (Romans 6:23, Ephesians 2:8), free Callings (Romans 11:29), free Crowns (2 Timothy 4:8, not works but wanting to see Jesus gets the crown, relational not works), and enter God's presence freely, "And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus. By his death,Jesus opened a new and life-giving way through the curtain into the Most Holy Place. And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s house, let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water." (Hebrews 10:19-22), Instead most believers want to believe they can merit an audience with God and be good enough, even through Jesus had to die for them (something they believe) because man can never be good enough to achieve salvation, God's acceptance, and earn righteousness. Thus the cycle of making Christ into a controlling overlord rather then Husband (Matthew 25:-11 + Revelation 19:7), a mean hearted messiah rather than the Meek and tender Savior with a light burden and yoke (Matthew 11:28-30) inevitably happens in the Church because Satan convinces Christians that their Lord is harsh, demanding, and always testing them.
We fully participate in God's identity theft. We allow the devil to convince us that God wants to reject us, hold us at a distance, test us, and even trick us when the Truth is that God accepts us (Romans 15:7), He never holds us at distance but lives in us! (Romans 8:10-11, 1 Corinthians 3:16), does not test us but helps us in temptation (Hebrews 2:18), and never tricks us but tricks Satan as He did on the cross (1 John 3:8). The sad fact is many Christians unwittingly and unknowingly make Christ in their minds more akin to Lucifer than the Loving Lord that died for them. It is the devil who is about position and making us into human doings, it is God who wants our presence, and made us Human beings (to be, as just exist is a blessing, Jesus made us Colossians 1:13-18, John 1:3).
To fight the devil's caricature and identity theft of the Trinity, you must believe the Sciptures and what they say God is like. Don't even take scriptures out of context, for this is what happened when Satan misquoted and contradicted the Scriptures, "Does it not say He will command his angels to catch you?" To which Jesus said, "Ah but the Scriptures also say do not test the Lord your God." (). We must be saturated in Holy Scriptures (Old and New Testaments) so that we may fight the identity theft the Thief who is Satan is trying to do to our minds, through TV and film, through people, and through even the Church system. We need a "Lifelock" that is Jesus who is the Life (John 14:6) and who holds keys to all locks (Revelation 1:17) and it is through The Holy Bible we know Jesus better and can test Satan's distortions of the Lord and stop letting Lucifer steal God's identity in our minds, and emotions which leads to actions.
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