However, all of this growth cannot take place without a little pain. Changing your identity is never an easy process, as you can spend most of your time feeling confused. Maybe you are being pulled in opposite directions. Perhaps you are having trouble breaking old habits. Yet, unlike many Christians that hold onto their habits, at least these college students have an excuse.
When a person becomes a Christian, they also go through an identity change. When you declare Jesus as Lord of your life, you are supposed to give up everything to follow Him. However, we usually end up hanging onto the things that we really like or those that would take the most effort to change. We give God most of our lives but keep a small percentage for ourselves. We try to be simultaneously selfless and selfish, completely dependent on Him but independent on our own, who He wants us to be and who we have always been. See the problem there?
Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. (James 3:11-12 NIV)
You can’t follow Christ and hang onto your old habits. You can’t sell out for your faith and still dabble in debauchery. You can’t change and remain the same.
You either surrender your life to Jesus Christ or you don’t. There is no in-between.