First of all, satan did it with our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
Remember Jesus’s temptation in the wilderness? Do you know they had nothing to do with satiating Jesus’s hunger? What satan was after during those temptations was Jesus’s identity.
Satan’s aim was to bring Christ to a place where He questioned or tried to do extras to prove His identity and position with God.
“If you are the Son of God, turn these stones into bread.”
Jesus did not need to perform any miracle to confirm His Sonship and position with God.
“If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and, ‘In their hands, they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’
Jesus did not need to throw Himself down to recognize that God’s angels have been assigned to Him.
Had satan been able to distort Jesus’s identity, even in the smallest way, Jesus would have been made unfit to continue with His assignment on earth.
Well, satan did not stop trying to attack and distort identities. He’s still at that game today. In fact, most of the attacks of the devil on the believer are to distort, change, or damage the believer’s identity.
It may look like the devil is after your health, money, marriage, or even your joy. But his actual aim is your identity – your position in Christ.
Why Is Satan After Your Identity?
When Jesus rose from the dead, He obtained victory and a new identity for us as believers. He gave us the power to become children of God and the right of attorney to His name.
Simultaneously, Jesus stripped the devil of whatever power he could have over the believer. So, the only power the devil can now have over you as a believer is the one you give him.
Let’s make this clear. The devil HATES believers. The fact that the defeat he suffered on account of Jesus’s sacrifice was all for you? Naaa. Satan’s hatred for you is indescribable.
So, he’ll do anything to exercise any form of authority over you so you can have a taste of your own medicine.
Also, God’s reason for saving you and making you His child is so that you can fill the earth with the knowledge of His Glory (Jesus Christ).
But you are God’s chosen treasure —priests who are kings, a spiritual “nation” set apart as God’s devoted ones. He called you out of darkness to experience his marvelous light, and now he claims you as his very own. He did this so that you would broadcast his glorious wonders throughout the world.
1 Peter 2:9
Since the devil could not stop Jesus from dying and paying the price for your identity, he does not mind doing anything to see that Jesus’s sacrifice is futile. And he will readily attack your identity so you do not live out the essence of your becoming a child of God.
Sure enough, no believer will consciously hand satan power over him. So, satan resorts to subtlety – making you give him that power without realizing what you are doing.
One of the significant ways satan gets you to give him power over you is by distorting your identity.
He makes you call, see, or behave yourself in ways that do not align with who God has called and made you.
What Happens When Satan Attacks Your Identity?
Your identity as a believer is your birth certificate into God’s family. It is your ticket to enjoying the victory Christ won on the cross. Your identity is your position in Christ.
So, if you’re stripped of your identity, you get misaligned from your position in Christ, you start to relinquish your victory to the devil, and you live short of the reason God saved you.
When your God-given identity is taken from you, your life will look as though Jesus did not already pay the price for your freedom.
And the devil knows that once he gets you on the identity level, it won’t be long before your actions and life’s pattern follow suit. Soon enough, you’ll become unfit to fulfill God’s purpose for making you His child.
Think about yourself as an employee in a huge company. You must show your ID each morning to gain access to the building. Now, let’s say you decide to give your ID card to your sister, who has just left town.
Do you still remain an employee of that company? Absolutely, yes! But will you be able to access your workstation for that day? Nope – unless you can get top management to let security give you a pass without an ID.
Now, this is what happens when the devil succeeds in distorting your identity as a believer. You remain a child of God. But you lose the ability to convert what Christ has done for you to your material world.
How Does Satan Attack Your Identity?
Now you know why satan is after your identity. Wouldn’t you love to know how he attacks your identity so you can always catch him in his tracks?
Yes? Good!
Now, here are a few ways satan tries to attack your identity as a believer
Persistent Adverse Circumstances
To be honest, unfavorable circumstances are not a good thing to experience. It gets even worse when that circumstance or situation persists despite your prayers, declaration, and physical interventions.
However, when what you’re going through makes you start to question the potency of God’s word in your life, know that an attack is in full launch on your identity.
When you start to wonder if you’re truly a child of God, loved and cherished by God (because that circumstance won’t just go away), know that the devil is attempting to change your identity.
You must stay with what God has said about you until your circumstances align with it.
When You Start to Call Yourself Who God Has Not Called You
Now, that you dabbled into error at any point in your faith walk does not make you any less of a child of God. Not at all.
So, you should know that the devil is beginning to attack your identity when you continue to wallow in guilt, regret, and shame and even start to call yourself names God did not call you.
What is God’s solution when you fall into sin as a believer? You repent and keep making progress in the faith.
But the devil wants you to stay there, feel all the negative emotions, call yourself all the bad names, and feel unworthy to keep being a child of God.
Do not let him steal your identity! When you fall into error, repent and keep moving in the grace God has supplied!
By Using People Around You To Distort Your Identity
Other times, satan attacks your identity through people (sometimes believers who rent their mouths to him).
People can say something to you or give you a label (maybe because of something you did). When that label does not align with who God calls you, that is satan’s attack on your identity.
If you pay attention to that label, you may subconsciously start to live according to it and become misaligned from purpose.
Always declare who God has called you to yourself to whomever it may eventually concern.
By Getting You to Compromise on Godly Living
This, here, has become quite a hard pill to swallow in the body of Christ. The only finger you ever lifted to become a holy child of God was to believe in Jesus’s sacrifice, no doubt.
But becoming a child of God is only a prerequisite to God’s purpose for sending His Son. God wants to fill the earth with the knowledge of His glory!
And you need to be fully aligned with who He has made you to successfully fulfill that purpose!
When the devil gets you to compromise on godly living, what he is simply doing is getting you misaligned from your identity in God – so that you do not fulfill God’s aim for your salvation.
You are holy because God declared you holy when you believed the finished work of the cross. But when you continue to live your life like one who belongs to the devil, you no longer align with the holy nature God conferred on you.
That’s an attack on your identity.
We pray that you would walk in the ways of true righteousness, pleasing God in every good thing you do. Then you’ll become fruit-bearing branches, yielding to his life, and maturing in the rich experience of knowing God in his fullness!
Colossians 1:10
Yes, there is a need for you to appropriate who you have become in Christ to your material world. That’s how you bear fruit and fulfill God’s purpose for saving you.
So, don’t let the enemy keep preaching the message of ‘it doesn’t matter’ to you because it does matter!
For you to fulfill God’s purpose for saving you, the way you conduct your life needs to conform to the God-life you have received. This is why Satan is after your identity. He doesn’t want you aligning to that identity so that you’ll remain useless to the kingdom of God.
Conclusion
Now you know why satan is after your identity and how he does it, I hope you keep an eye open to stop him when he tries.
Like I said, this game is all about subtlety. You’ll need more than a blog on the internet to catch it.
Take some minutes to ask God for help.
