Our Identity as Christians – Greg Albrecht

Question/Comment:

Would not most evangelicals say that their inherent identity (and every other human’s) is flawed from birth? This assumed flawed identity shows itself by sin. So sin becomes a part of our identity? What about the new identity we are given in Christ — his new creations (2 Corinthians 5)?  If we accept this teaching, we feel guilt and shame. Of course sin requires repentance and restitution, with which I agree.

But if we continue to sin after forgiveness (and we all will of course) according to this teaching our identity is affected, even though the forgiven child of God feels and knows God has forgiven them. Would it not be natural to find it difficult to forgive yourself because you continued with the behavior, even though God has forgiven it?

What if God never viewed your identity as flawed or sinful, but only your behavior which is distinct from your being requires restoration, but has no effect on your internal existence.

Response:

Appreciate your question/comment, it seems to me to be perceptive, exemplifying critical thinking which is not always encouraged within Christ-less religion. Allow me to begin my two cents by way of a response with your last sentence, which in fact I see as a rhetorical question: “What if God never viewed your identity as flawed or sinful, but your behavior which is distinct from your being only requires further restoration, but has on effect on your internal existence.”

Any power that sin had over us was overcome and terminated at and on the Cross, rendered null and void. That is the continuing and oft repeated message of the gospel of Jesus Christ.  

In the light of how the Cross of Christ is “played out” and interpreted, taught and preached and believed, the query then becomes, at least for me, another rhetorical question: shall we allow anyone, no matter how prestigious their professional insights might otherwise be deemed to be, to define our relationship with God as tenuous, on-again, off-again, plagued by guilt and shame? Shall the good news of the gospel be forever overshadowed by a religious rattling of the skeletal remains and ashes of sin, obliterated by the Cross? 

Must we, being free in Christ from the yoke of bondage under which we once lived, hide from God in the shadows just as Adam and Eve sought to do, hiding their nudity from God (as if it was possible) in the Garden of Eden? Did the Cross of Christ overcome death and sin with the exception of, as you term it, our “inherent identity” (some within Christendom even call it “total depravity’) as flawed from birth?  If we live in Jesus, and he in us, how can we allow ourselves to believe we actually live in the shadows when he is the Light of the world?

This topic — generally known as “The Fall/Original Sin” is, as I see it, used by much of Christless institutionalized religion as a club, a tool of shame and guilt to repress humanity and deny them/us the grace, love and mercy of God. It is a hallowed and sacrosanct doctrine seldom questioned, though it quite obviously is at odds with the New Testament, the new covenant in Christ, the gospel and his Cross. The disturbing incongruity of this fundamental doctrinal assertion, disturbing in its apparent diminishing of the Cross, deserves to be held under the Light of the Light — the way and the truth and the life. 

That said, we are preparing a cover story on this topic for our October CWR 2026 issue — one of many on our drawing boards right now.  Some of the topics we address, this one certainly, need careful research and preparation — so bear with us, more to come in the October 2026 issue of Christianity Without the Religion. 

Thanks for your well thought out question 

In Christ

Greg Albrecht   

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