Thirty-four articles. One series. And the question we have been answering, from every angle, through every passage, in every dimension of the new-creation life, is the same question that has been at the centre of human confusion since the Fall:
Who are you?
Not who were you — the person formed in Adam, shaped by sin, alienated from God, subject to the condemnation of the broken law, living under the dominion of death. That person existed. That person was real. And that person has been put to death — crucified with Christ, buried with Him, rendered legally extinct.
The question now — the question the entire New Testament presses the believer to answer correctly and to live from with confidence — is who you are:
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” — 2 Corinthians 5:17 (KJV)
A new creature. Not an improved version of the old one. Not the same person with better habits and stronger resolutions. A new creature — a new species of being that did not exist before the resurrection of Christ made it possible, brought into existence by the same creative power that spoke light into darkness and life into lifelessness. This is who you are. And the entire life of the new creation is the process of learning, believing, and living from this truth.
The Answer Adam Could Not Give
Before the new creation can fully understand who they are, they must understand who they were — because the contrast is the measure of the transformation.
Adam was created in the image and likeness of God — the crown of creation, designed for fellowship with God, given dominion over the created order, destined for glory. And Adam fell. The Fall was not merely a moral failure — it was an identity catastrophe. The spirit that had been alive toward God died. The relationship of open fellowship with God was broken. The image that had been clear became marred. Shame replaced dignity, fear replaced fellowship, and the dominion that had been Adam’s became subject to the enemy.
Every human being born after Adam entered the world in this condition — in Adam, with Adam’s nature, subject to Adam’s penalty: “For as in Adam all die.” — 1 Corinthians 15:22 (KJV). The Adamic identity is the identity of a fallen creature: spiritually dead, alienated from God, under condemnation, ruled by the flesh, dominated by sin, and without the authority, righteousness, or standing that God had designed humanity to carry.
This is the identity that the cross abolished.
“Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.” — Romans 6:6 (KJV)
The old man — the Adamic self, the fallen-nature person who had been in Adam — was crucified with Christ. Not improved, not reformed, not put on a spiritual improvement programme. Crucified. And buried. And out of that burial, something entirely new was raised — something that did not exist before, could not have existed apart from the resurrection of Jesus Christ:
The new creation.
The Death and the Resurrection — Romans 6:3–6 and Ephesians 2:4–6
The mechanism by which the new creation came into being is the union of the believer with Christ in His death and resurrection — and this union is the ground on which every other dimension of new creation identity stands.
“Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” — Romans 6:3–4 (KJV)
Buried with Him. Raised with Him. The new creation is not the product of moral self-improvement or spiritual discipline. It is the product of a death and a resurrection — an event in which the believer was joined to Christ in His death (the old man died with Him) and joined to Christ in His resurrection (the new creation rose with Him). What died with Christ stays dead. What rose with Christ is alive — permanently, irrevocably, with the resurrection life of the Lord Jesus Himself.
Paul’s declaration in Ephesians moves the geography of this resurrection:
“But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” — Ephesians 2:4–6 (KJV)
Quickened together. Raised together. Seated together. In heavenly places. The new creation is not a creature of the earth trying to reach heaven. They are a creature of the heavenly places — positioned there by the resurrection and exaltation of Christ, seated with Him at the right hand of the Father, far above every principality and power.
“I, Yet Not I” — Galatians 2:20
Paul’s most personal declaration of what the new creation is emerges from his testimony in Galatians:
“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.” — Galatians 2:20 (KJV)
Four movements in one verse that describe the inner architecture of the new creation’s identity:
I am crucified with Christ. The old I — the Adamic I, the self formed in sin and condemnation — was crucified with Christ at the cross. This is past tense, completed, final.
Nevertheless I live. The new creation is not the absence of a self — it is the presence of a new self, alive in a way the old self never was. The crucifixion did not produce emptiness. It produced resurrection.
Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. This is the defining reality of the new-creation life. The life the new creation now lives is not an upgraded natural life — it is the life of Christ, lived through a human vessel that has been emptied of the Adamic self and filled with the risen Lord. The new creation’s life, at its deepest, is not their own life. It is Christ’s life, lived through them.
I live by the faith of the Son of God. The operating principle of this indwelled life is the faithfulness of Jesus — the faith that flows from the recognition that He loved me and gave Himself for me, and that trust in His finished work is the basis for every moment of the new-creation life.
“Hid with Christ in God” — Colossians 3:1–4
“If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.” — Colossians 3:1–4 (KJV)
Your life is hid with Christ in God. The new creation’s true life — their real identity, their deepest self, the person they actually are — is not visible on the surface of ordinary daily circumstances. It is hidden with Christ in God. Safe. Secured. Beyond the reach of any force that would define, diminish, or destroy it.
The enemy cannot touch the life that is hid with Christ in God. Circumstances cannot determine it. Failure cannot cancel it. The opinions of others cannot revise it. The true identity of the new creation is held in the most secure location in the universe — in God Himself.
When Christ, who is our life, shall appear. The new creation’s identity is not a theological position they hold about themselves. It is a person — Christ, who is their life. The new creation does not have a new identity as an abstract property. They have Christ — and in having Christ, they have everything the new creation is, carries, and will ultimately be fully revealed to be at His return.
The Capstone Declaration — 2 Peter 1:3–4
The most audacious statement in the entire New Testament about the identity of the new creation is the one that brings the series to its climax:
“According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.” — 2 Peter 1:3–4 (KJV)
All things that pertain unto life and godliness. Not some things. Not enough to scrape through. All things — a comprehensive provision that covers every dimension of the new creation’s life. Already given. Not to be requested through sustained petition — given, past tense, present possession. The new creation who understands this approaches their life not from a position of lack but from a position of abundance: I have been given everything I need for the life I have been called to live.
Partakers of the divine nature. These four words are the most extraordinary four words in the entire description of what it means to be in Christ. Koinonoi — sharers, participants, ones who hold in common — of the divine nature. The nature of God. Not merely the influence of God, not merely the assistance of God, not merely the example of God — the nature of God itself.
The new creation does not merely receive help from a God who remains at a distance. They receive the participation in the very nature of the God who is love, who is holy, who is righteous, who is powerful, who is eternal. The Divine Being — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — has taken up residence in the new creation and made them sharers in His own nature. This is not mysticism or metaphor. It is the precise, deliberate declaration of the Apostle Peter about what Christ’s exceedingly great and precious promises have accomplished.
Having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. The contrast is exact: the fallen world is characterised by phthora — decay, corruption, the progressive deterioration of everything that the Fall produced. The new creation has escaped that system. Not by their own strength — but by having been joined to the One whose nature is incorruptible, and whose incorruptible nature has been imparted to them.
Who Is the New Creation? — The Integrated Answer
Having moved through thirty-five articles, the answer can now be stated in its fullness:
The new creation is a person who was dead in Adam and has been made alive in Christ — crucified with Him, buried with Him, raised with Him, and seated with Him in heavenly places. The old man who was in Adam is gone; the new creation who is in Christ has taken their place.
The new creation is a person who stands before God in the righteousness of Christ — not the righteousness they have earned or can earn, but the righteousness of God Himself, imputed through faith and imparted through union with the risen Christ. The new creation does not approach God tentatively; they come boldly to the throne of grace, as children who know their Father.
The new creation is a person who carries the authority of the name above every name — the legal right to enforce the victory of the cross in every situation where the enemy seeks to operate, to pray with the confidence of one who has been seated above every principality and power, to declare what God has said over every circumstance that challenges it.
The new creation is a person indwelled by the Holy Spirit — the Spirit of adoption who cries Abba Father, the Spirit who sheds the love of God abroad in the heart, the Spirit who is the earnest of the full inheritance, the Spirit who leads, teaches, empowers, and intercedes.
The new creation is a person who is loved with the love of God — not conditionally, not based on performance, but with the agape that loved while we were yet sinners, that is shed abroad by the Spirit who was given to us, that makes the new creation capable of loving with the love of God Himself.
The new creation is a person on a mission — an ambassador for Christ, carrying the ministry of reconciliation to a world that does not yet know the barrier is down, that the enmity is dealt with, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.
The new creation is a person with a hope — the blessed hope of the glorious appearing of the great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, the parousia that will complete what the new birth began, the resurrection that will clothe the new creation’s mortal body with immortality, and the eternity that will bring the face-to-face fullness of everything that is now held by faith.
The new creation is a partaker of the divine nature — not a creature reaching upward toward a God who remains at a distance, but a creature in whom the God of the universe has taken up His dwelling place, sharing His nature, expressing His life, manifesting His love.
“As he is, so are we in this world.” — 1 John 4:17 (KJV)
As He is. Not as we used to be. Not as the world says we are. Not as our past failures defined us. As He is — in this world, now, today — so are we.
The Life That Follows
This truth is not a platform from which to declare spiritual superiority. It is a foundation from which to live with radical generosity, with unshakeable faith, with fearless love, and with urgent, world-changing mission. The new creation that truly knows who they are does not become proud — they become free. Free from the fear that defined the fallen life. Free from the striving that comes from not knowing you are already accepted. Free to love, because perfect love has cast out fear. Free to give, because the supply of the One who indwells them is inexhaustible. Free to stand, because the ground of the finished work of Christ is immovable.
The series has covered the terrain. The declaration has been made. The provision has been laid out. Now comes the daily living of what the new creation is — the pressing toward the mark, the holding fast the confession, the walking in love, the building on the rock, the abiding in the vine, the exercising of the senses by reason of use, the growing up into Him in all things.
“According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness.” — 2 Peter 1:3 (KJV)
All things. Already given. In Christ. Now live it.
Bible Verses Cited: 2 Corinthians 5:17–21; 2 Peter 1:3–4; Galatians 2:20; Colossians 3:1–4; Ephesians 2:4–6; Romans 6:3–6; 1 Corinthians 15:22; 1 John 4:17; Romans 8:16–17; Ephesians 1:3; Philippians 3:14; John 15:5 (KJV)
Series: New Creation in Christ Jesus — Article 35 of 35
Author: Joseph Olarewaju | FaithBibleStudy.org
