Me, myself, and I, three of more than likely the most spoken words in the human language, but one must wonder, how many times in context, needed within the conversation, and how many times in the way of pride.
“I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.” (Isaiah 14:14) This is the verse that always comes to my mind when I contemplate these three words and how directly opposite they are to “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” (Gal. 2:20)
When they are used in the context of pride, whether it be in the attempt to draw attention to ourselves from others no matter the reasoning, or if we speak them only silently, in our minds, attempting to find good within ourselves, they are of pride, and pride says, “I don’t need God.” I have had what I would call debates, what those whom I was speaking with would call arguments, at least from my end of the conversation, about the Scriptures, specifically about the men that God used to write them. Most of the time these are individuals that fit Romans 3:18 quite well, “There is no fear of God before their eyes,” and their contention point is that the Bible was only written by men, and not inspired by God. (2 Tim. 3:16)
If my lovely wife was to sit down and write a letter to you about this same subject matter, the conclusion would be the same, but the context, the heart of the letter, if you will, would sound different, for we do not share the same character traits, our backgrounds have only minor similarities, and the way we view the world is different, if nothing else because she is female, I am male. Peter probably did not hang around John a lot before they became apostles, the ruff, gruff cursing fisherman more than likely never gave a second thought, or even a first, to laying his head on Christ chest. And Paul, for a long time, all he wanted to do was get rid of those Christians.
When we die to Christ, there is a certain part of us that remains, you may call it what you will, I personally think of it as our nature, albeit our nature without sin. When I was very small, I could not comprehend how anyone would want to do anything else than what I wanted to do, but those things do not intrigue me are they once did, does that make me a different person, or am I the same person only with different taste. Psychologists like to term this our “Inner Psyche,” the who of who we are down deep at our core, and for some people I believe I can quite earnestly say that they have never met that person, they do not know who they are. They may know what they like to do, but they cannot explain in depth why.
“Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2) So, does that mean that in a moment, in that twinkling of an eye if you are blessed to be raptured, that you will have the mind of Christ, that in a sense the you that you have been all these years is going to die, be completely gone forever, and you will be just a clone of Christ, albeit without His Godhead? Of course not, I will always be me, every hope, dream, ambition that I have that is not part of my sinful nature, which will finally be gone in the most blessed day, I will still have, I will distinctly and forever be me.
The me, myself, and I that will be removed from us is not just the sinful nature that we all have to deal with each day, but it is that part of us that seeks anything solely for the pleasure of self, it is the part of us that cannot put Christ first in every aspect and area of our existence.
By giving all we are to Christ, we die to self, but not all of us, when our sinful nature is removed, we will not become automatons, we will not be “mini-Jesus,” we will be completely and wholly us, the us we always have wanted to be, because we have freely given all that we are to Him.
