There are many different ways to help people discover their true identity in Christ. The Lord impressed upon me the following perspective a few years ago which due to my own personal challenges helped me quite a bit.
Inferior: lower in status, quality or position
Theologically, many Christians understand that He has raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph. 2:6.) We are positioned far above all principality and power. We have been given authority in the earth to extend His kingdom. And yet for many, it is more of a theory than a reality. They feel inferior.
Most of us have dealt with the enemy of inferiority on some level of life. Many feel inferior to other people, inferior to sickness, inferior to money, inferior in our educational status, our marital status or our means of making a living.
Quiet personalities can feel inferior to the more outgoing. In the church women are often made to feel inferior to men (due to a wrong understanding of Scripture).
Inferiority is a fruit of the root of fear. You may not think you live in fear, but to the degree you feel inferior to others or to circumstances, you ARE living in fear.
For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. (2 Tim. 1:7)
Our new creation reality is that the spirit of fear (and by extension, inferiority) is no longer a part of our nature. Our true nature is one of power, love and a sound mind. But if we don’t embrace that truth and we allow our past to dominate our present, we can continue to live our lives feeling inferior.
When the doctor says you have a terminal disease, do you feel inferior to the disease? When your bank account declares that you don’t have enough, do you feel inferior to the power of money?
Something that set me free a long time ago was the realization that I was just as valuable to God as anyone else on this planet. My opinion is just as important. My faith has just as much potential as anyone else’s faith. My status in the Kingdom comes from Jesus in me, not from my education, money or personality.
As a quick example, I just to be very afraid to speak in public. I have horror stories of traumatic events in my life in which I allowed fear and inferiority to shape me and hold me in bondage. Today, I understand who Christ is in me.
Today my favorite thing to do is share the Word with people. The bigger the crowd, the better I like it. I don’t care who is in the room. I know that God has put a message in me and the spirit of love and a sound mind is in charge now. I refuse to live in fear!