As Christians should we categorize or identify ourselves by our ongoing propensity toward a particular sin? What about identifying ourselves by our previous sinful lifestyle choices? How should Christians rightly think of their identity?

In this episode of the Straight Truth Podcast, host Dr. Josh Philpot asks Dr. Richard Caldwell what would he say to someone who calls themselves a “gay Christian”. What would he say to someone who identifies themselves this way? Dr. Caldwell says that if a person is indeed born again, if indeed a person is regenerate and are calling themselves a “gay Christian”, they have misidentified their identity. They are not a “gay Christian”. Dr. Caldwell and D. Philpot’s discussion moves from a simple answer to this question to a more detailed discussion of why this is an unbiblical way to describe ourselves as believers.

Dr. Caldwell says that if someone is a homosexual, they are not a Christian. Conversely, if they are a Christian, they are not a homosexual. To think of ourselves any other way is not a New Testament concept. Dr. Caldwell explains that if we indeed are born again, we are new creations in Christ Jesus. We have new loves, new hatreds, and new capacities that we never had before. We once were in the flesh and slaves to our fleshly desires. Now, we are in the Spirit and slaves to Christ. We are to put off the old self and live as the new creation that we are, putting to death the sins of the flesh.

A Clear Biblical Example

Dr. Caldwell next gives us a clear biblical example of what this looks like from 1 Corinthians 6. Paul reminds the believers in Corinth that those who go on living in unrighteousness will not inherit the kingdom of God. Afterward, he gives a list of sins that once described some of the Corinthian believers, saying, such were some of you. Paul makes clear that these believers are not to go on thinking of themselves in these ways. He reminds them that they have been washed, sanctified, and justified.

They were people who once lived categorized by these particular sins in the past. But now as believers, they no longer belong to those categories because they have been saved by the Lord Jesus. Dr. Caldwell then explains that we all deal with predispositions, bents, with respect to sin that reflects our fallenness. He takes a moment to share some examples of this. Yet, as he explains, we should not labor to label ourselves by these categories of sin. We must not label or define ourselves by our sins. Doing this causes us to misidentify our identity.

Dr. Philpot mentions that this reminds him of what Paul teaches in Romans 6. We are to consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to Christ in God. The word consider, calls us as believers to know who we are, to know our identity. Dr. Caldwell says this is what the Christian life involves. It involves the ongoing consideration of things that are true. We are to go about preaching the truth to ourselves, the way things really are.

Alive To Christ Jesus

We are alive to Christ Jesus and are now in an entirely new relationship to sin. We must go on thinking in terms of these realities. What we feel is not that which defines us. What we know is what defines us. So we need to be reminded of what we know is true. So then, as this pertains to the question of identifying one’s self as a “gay Christian”, Dr. Caldwell reminds us that our identity is not rooted and grounded in how we feel about ourselves. Our identity is in what God says about us, and that is where we need to set our attention. We must not embrace a view of ourselves from the culture but embrace our view of ourselves from the Scriptures.