Who do you want to be?
For many years I used to make resolutions at the beginning of a new year. I would look at all the things I wanted to accomplish and make to-do lists and set goals and try to come up with strategies for doing all these things I thought were so important. And, to be honest, this helped to some extent. I usually got more done in some of those areas of my life than I would have if I hadn’t set those goals. I should have asked myself: Who do you want to be?
But all too often, I would lose sight of my goals and resolutions partway through the year and not really accomplish the things I said I wanted to.
More recently I’ve been taking a different approach. My focus now, and not just at the beginning of a new year, is not to focus so much on what I want to do, but to think of what kind of person I want to be.
Who will you be in 2026?
When you set your goals and make New Year’s resolutions based on what you want to achieve, it’s sometimes kind of like putting the cart before the horse. You may get somewhere, but it might not be as productive as you’d like and it’s harder to get where you really want to go.
To make lasting change in your behavior and what you do or don’t do, you need to focus on who you are, who you are becoming. Or to take a little deeper, you need to discover who you already are as a child of God made in His image and likeness.
When you know who you are, you will do what is right for you to do. A lot of experts say you should do something first, make it a habit, and then your mind will catch up with your actions. But this really never changes you at a very deep level.
It’s kind of like the fellow who told all his friends how easy it was to stop smoking. In fact, it was so easy, he had stopped smoking dozens of times.
But he always picked it back up and he never really quit smoking entirely because he didn’t change how he saw himself.
So often, we try to change the external circumstances and think that will solve a problem.
How do you identify yourself?
But the Bible talks a lot about the importance of how we see and identify ourselves.
The book of Proverbs makes a profound observation about a man who is selfish and perhaps even wicked.
For as he thinks in his heart, so is he. Proverbs 23:7 NKJV
If you think selfish, evil thoughts, if you identify yourself with these thoughts, you will act accordingly.
This same process is true about a righteous person as well.
If you think unselfish thoughts, if, in your heart, you have only loving thoughts and see yourself in that light, you’ll be more loving to yourself and others.
The way you see yourself determines to a large degree how you act.
Who do you want to be, a negative or a positive person?
Have you ever known someone who had a negative opinion of themselves? Maybe you’ve even felt that way about yourself at times. I certainly have.
I used to have a very negative view of myself. And I lived my life accordingly. I was never good enough, smart enough, strong enough, fill-in-the-blank enough to do and be what I wanted to.
The more I have come to see myself as the image and likeness of God—and I don’t mean just being able to say those words, which I’ve done for decades—I’ve discovered a deeper sense of my purpose in life and actually begun working toward it instead of floundering in hopelessness.
How do you see yourself right now? And I don’t want you to answer with an automatic pat answer of what you think you’re supposed to say: “I’m a child of God” without really feeling the depth of what that means.
How do you really see yourself? Who do you want to be? That’s the place to start. If you really do see yourself as the child of God, made in His image and likeness and never have a single doubt as to the truth of that statement, then you are a remarkable individual.
When you have doubts…
But if you’re like most of us, you do have doubts and uncertainties about whether you are the image and likeness of God and wonder how that could possibly be true, that’s okay, for the moment. You’re being honest with yourself. But you don’t need to stay there.
So, how do you see yourself? Let’s ask it this way: How would you like to be able to see yourself? Who do you want to be?
Right here there’s a fork in the road, two paths that eventually end up going in opposite directions.
You can answer the question, “who do you want to be?”, by trying to figure it all out by yourself. Through human will and determination, you can make a plan based on your personal desires. Or you can take the other path and instead of trying to make something happen, you focus on discovering how God has already created you. It becomes a time of discovery of what’s already true instead of trying to create something on your own.
Who do you want to be?
I’m going to assume, since you’re listening to this podcast about the Bible and being more like Jesus, you would prefer to take the path of discovering how God has already created you, and what you’re capable of, discovering what is already true and will always be true about you.
The more you see yourself, and I mean see yourself on a deep spiritual level, as the image and likeness of God, loved and cherished by God in every way, the more you’ll do the things God has made you capable of.
I love the story of Gideon in the Old Testament because, at the core, it’s really a story of a man who discovered more of his true identity as a child of God, a servant of God, who was capable of much more than was possible when he had a limited sense of who he was.
Gideon didn’t know who he really was
When the angel of the Lord first appeared to Gideon and said he would deliver Israel from the Midianites, Gideon had a pretty negative view of himself. He replied to the angel,
Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.” Judges 6:15 NIV
By the way, Manasseh was the smallest tribe in Israel. So in effect, Gideon was identifying himself as the least important person in his immediate family and then in his clan, and then in his tribe of Manasseh, which was the smallest tribe in Israel, and therefore in all of Israel. He was saying he was the least important person in all of Israel. That’s a pretty negative and limited self-image.
Have you ever felt unqualified for something? Have you ever had such a limited sense of your identity it was impossible to see how you could possibly bring a solution to the problem at hand?
But God didn’t accept Gideon’s view of himself as having one tiny bit of validity or truth. God knew he had made Gideon in His own image and likeness, even if Gideon didn’t identify himself that way. God knew what Gideon was capable of as a child of God, even if Gideon doubted it.
How do you see yourself?
It all comes back to how you see yourself, how you identify yourself.
So, who do you want to be in 2026? Here’s another way to ask the question: Who does God want you to be in 2026? Or even better: How much of who God has already made you to be as His image and likeness will you discover about yourself in 2026?
There’s no one perfectly worded answer. You could say you wanted to discover who you are as the image and likeness of God. You could say you wanted to be a true follower of Jesus. You could say you wanted to be a problem solver or healer.
Do you identify yourself by who you are or what you do?
The more you think about how to answer this question, the more you see how easy it is to define yourself by what you do instead of who you are.
It’s so important to focus on who you are before you think about what you want to do. Even being a follower of Jesus, which a wonderful desire to have, is kind of about what you do. The only way to truly follow Christ is first to know who you are as a child of God.
If you try to follow Christ without this inner awareness of your spiritual identity, you may be going through the right motions and saying the right words and even making some spiritual progress, and it might be a good place to start. But you won’t experience the full depth of what it means to be a follower of Jesus until you see yourself as God’s child, made in His image and likeness.
Take a moment right now to deeply ponder the great fact that you are indeed made in the image and likeness of the one, true, and everlasting God. All that God is, His love, His grace, His wisdom, His strength, and everything else, you are the image and likeness of. This is your identity. This is who you are and you are capable right this moment of seeing and accepting this fact.
Who do you want to be? The image and likeness of God!
Once you know who you are as God’s image and likeness, you will do amazing things as God’s image and likeness.
You’ll follow Jesus more and more closely. You will obey his commandments. You will, as Jesus said,
Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he [God] will give you everything you need. Matthew 6:33 NLT
Jesus also said,
If you love me, you will keep my commandments. John 14:15 ESV
But the love has to come before the obedience. And before you can love Jesus, I mean fully love Jesus, you have to see yourself as someone who is capable of loving Jesus in this way. You need to see Jesus as someone worthy of this kind of love.
And the only way to really do this in all its depth and breadth, is to know who you are as a child of God, to see yourself as the image and likeness of God.
One step at a time
Now we come into this by degrees. You can’t do it all in one fell swoop overnight. But this is where we start.
If you see yourself as someone struggling to do what’s right but you’re often tempted by what the material world has to offer, you won’t be able to put your love for Jesus into practice as much as you could if you saw more clearly that you’re the image and likeness of God, who isn’t fooled by temptation.
If the window in your bedroom is covered with mud, the sunlight can’t come in. The more mud you clean away, the more light comes in.
The more you see yourself as the image and likeness of God, the more you will see and feel the love for Jesus and the more you will follow him.
So, it really all comes back to how you see yourself. And how you see yourself determines what you see yourself capable of doing.
Being consistent in how you see yourself
Now you may be thinking: Hey James, I know I’m made in the image and likeness of God, but I don’t always really believe it or feel it. Sometimes I see myself in a really negative way, but most of the time it’s somewhere between those two extremes. How can I start to see myself more consistently as God’s image and likeness?
This is such a great question. How can we be more consistent in seeing, accepting, and really knowing at a deep level that we are God’s children, made in His image and likeness?
I said earlier that it all comes down to how you see yourself. But let’s take that one step further.
Why is it even possible for you to see yourself as the image and likeness of God? It can’t come just from wishful thinking. It’s possible for you to see yourself this way because that’s the way God made you and that’s the way God sees you. This is so clearly put in Genesis.
So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good indeed. Genesis 1:27, 31 CSB
Who do you want to be today?
God created you, sees you, and recognizes you as His image and likeness. He sees you as “very good indeed.”
The only reason you’re able to see yourself this way is because it’s already a fact. It’s the way God made you, the only way God sees you.
We need to remind ourselves of this every day. Recently I did an episode on this very topic, Episode 297: Always Remember Who You Are. I’ll have that link in the show notes if you’d like to listen to it. There are some really helpful ideas there. https://thebiblespeakstoyou.com/always-remember-who-you-are/
Okay, so you’ve made some mistakes, you’ve got some problems, you’ve committed some sins. So have we all. But God sees right through all that back to the way He originally made you in His image and likeness.
So when I ask you, “Who do you want to be in 2026?”, the only real answer is that you are already the image and likeness of God and that you want to see that more clearly, accept it on a deeper level, and live out from that truth by doing what God compels you to do as His child.
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James Early, the Jesus Mindset Coach, is a Bible teacher, speaker, and church mentor. He conducts Bible workshops online and in person. His focus is on getting back to the original Christianity of Jesus by learning to think, pray, and love like Jesus. Contact him here.
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Bible References
Proverbs 23:7 NKJV
7 For as he thinks in his heart, so is he.
Judges 6:15 NIV
15 Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but how can I save Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.”
Matthew 6:33 NLT
33 Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he [God] will give you everything you need.
John 14:15 ESV
15 If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
Genesis 1:27, 31 CSB
27 So God created man in his own image;
he created him in the image of God;
he created them male and female.
31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good indeed.
