The INTERNET is full of surveys and questionnaires that you can take to help you understand who you are. Tony Evans chimed in on this topic with the following illustration. He said, ‘I’ve got three envelopes: a big one, a smaller one, and a smaller one yet. I’ve also got a slip of paper. The Bible says that we are in Christ and that Christ is in us. The smallest envelope has “Tony Evans” written on it. The slip of paper has “Jesus” written on it. The Bible says that when Tony Evans accepted Jesus Christ, Christ came inside of Tony Evans. Christ, the slip of paper, is inside the envelope that represents Tony Evans, but not only is Christ in Tony Evans, but Tony Evans is in Christ. The slip of paper Christ is in Tony Evans, but when Tony Evans accepted Christ, Tony Evans came inside of Christ. I put the Tony Evans envelope into the Christ envelope. Now, the Bible says that Christ is in God. So we’re going to slip the Christ envelope into the God envelope. So to now get to Tony Evans, you’ve got to go through God, and then you have to go through Christ, and after you’ve gone through God, and gotten through Christ, then you get to Tony Evans. However, when you’ve gone through God, and gotten to Christ, and think you’ve have gotten ahold of Tony Evans when you open up Tony Evans, he’s full of Jesus Christ. So I am in Christ, Christ is in me, Christ is in God, God is in Christ, so I am well covered by Jesus Christ and His heavenly Father.’ ¹ Identity, knowing you are. That’s our focus on this week’s Light on Life.

Why Doing the Word of God Is The Ticket to Success

Listen to the Audio

Click to Listen | Right Click to Download | Subscribe in iTunes

[Tweet “God’s name is Yahweh, not God. He is also known as El Shaddai in the Bible and by many other names.”]

Who Are You? Jesus Knew Who He Was

John 10:30–36 (ESV) — 30 I and the Father are one.” 31 The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. 32 Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?” 33 The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” 34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? 35 If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— 36 do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?

• The Jews took issue with Jesus declaring Himself One with God.
• We looked a little bit at the ‘one with God’ issue in verse thirty in a previous podcast.

Who Are You? Jesus Unpopular Response

• What we have here in the next verse is the Jew’s reaction to Jesus’ one with God’ declaration.
• The reaction was anything but positive.
• If Jesus were running for President of Israel, he wouldn’t have gotten a vote from any of the religious establishment.
• The Jews in a heated fashion told Jesus that, since He was a man, He had no business calling Himself God.
• Jesus’ response to all of this negativity is worthy of the history books.
• It should go down as one of the defining moments in understanding human identity.
• You need to hear it and embrace it.
• Many people struggle in this area of knowing who they are.
• We mentioned this in a previous podcast.
• That’s why you hear about those who are always, it seems like, tossing and turning emotionally.
• They’re a massive expedition trying to find themselves.
• If you understand what Jesus said in these verses, the days of unrest where human identity is concerned would be over.
• You’ll never doubt it again.

Who Are You? The Answer

• The answer to who you are in these verses.
• Read these words believing.
• Hear these words receiving.
• Jesus did not struggle with knowing who He was.
• He knew who He was, and He knew where He was going.
• Listen to what He said.

Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?

• Jesus told them who he was, ‘I am the Son of God.’
• But you need to know the Old Testament verse He used in declaring His identity because it has full implications for your life.
• Jesus said, ‘Is it not written in your law, ‘I said you are gods?’
• So, then there’s a Bible verse that says this.
• Where is that verse? — I’m glad you asked; it’s in Psalm 82.

Who Are You? Psalm 82

• That’s what Jesus quoted, and here it is.

Psalm 82 (ESV) — A PSALM OF ASAPH. 1 God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment: 2 “How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? Selah 3 Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. 4 Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.” 5 They have neither knowledge nor understanding, they walk about in darkness; all the foundations of the earth are shaken. 6 I said, “You are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you; 7 nevertheless, like men you shall die, and fall like any prince.” 8 Arise, O God, judge the earth; for you shall inherit all the nations!

• Let’s drill down into Psalm 82 because doing so will help us understand what Jesus said in John 10 about Himself and about you.

Who Are You? How Does Understanding the Divine Council Help?

• The Scripture we just read said, ‘God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.’
• A couple of questions immediately come to mind.
• Like, number one, what is the divine council?
• And then, number two, who are the little ‘g’ gods in this verse?
• By looking at this second question, we will have the background to answer the first.

Defining Elohim

• I mean, you have God — capital G —, and you have gods — small ‘g’ in the same verse.
• Whose who here?
• Let’s look at a Hebrew definition, and with that thought, here’s the definition of the day.
• The Hebrew word we want to look at is the word for God: it is the word ‘elohim.’
• It is the plural form of God.
• Now, you may ask, why is the word plural?
• And, the answer to that is that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• Another fact you need to know is that this Hebrew word ‘elohim’ is used over 2500 times in the Old Testament.
• In those 2500 plus cases, the word is not just used of the God-head, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
• It is used for other beings.
• The word ‘elohim’ is a generic term for God.
• After all, you already know that the word God is not a name for the Most High.

‘God’ Is Not His Name

• The term ‘God’ reflects who He is.

Exodus 6:2–3 (ESV) — 2 God spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am the LORD. 3 I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the LORD I did not make myself known to them.

• There are three terms for God in this verse.
• Two of them are names for the Most High in this passage — this is how you read those names in Hebrew.

‘Elohim’ spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am Yahweh. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as El Shaddai, but by my name Yahweh I did not make myself known to them.

• God’s name is Yahweh.
• Looking at it a different way: you were born a human, but you may not have had a name for a few days because your parents were trying to decide that.
• This may be a poor example, but you get the point.
• God’s name is Yahweh, not God.
• He is also known as El Shaddai in the Bible and in this verse, and by many other names which He revealed to mankind.

‘Elohim is a Common Translation for God

• So, ‘elohim’ is common for God.
• It is used of your God and my God, Yahweh, the Most High, over 2000 times.
• But, of the remaining 500 or so occurrences, other spirit beings are called ‘elohim’ in the Bible as well.²

False Little ‘g’ gods Are ‘Elohim’

1 Kings 11:33 (ESV) — 33 because they have forsaken me and worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of Moab, and Milcom the god of the Ammonites, and they have not walked in my ways, doing what is right in my sight and keeping my statutes and my rules, as David his father did.

• Chemosh was the little ‘g’ god of Moab.
• The Hebrew word for little ‘g’ god here in 1 Kings 11:33 is the word ‘elohim.’
• So false little ‘g’ gods were ‘elohim,’ spirit beings.
• Now, that takes a little bit of explanation.

False Idols Are ‘Elohim’

• If you were like me, you thought that idols and images carved by men’s hands were just that, man-made blocks of wood and stone.
• But, ancient people believed that when they fashioned these images made out man-made materials, that the false spirit it represented would possess that image that block of wood or stone.
• Paul alludes to this belief in his first epistle to the Corinthians.

1 Corinthians 10:19–20 (ESV) — 19 What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? 20 No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons.

• When people offered a food sacrifice to an idol, it wasn’t a zero thing, like it’s all make-believe.
• No, when people offered to a block of wood or a block of stone, an image carved by human hands, it wasn’t just human nothingness, like children at play using their imaginations.
• No, demons responded to these offerings — they got all stirred up.
• Paul said, ‘I don’t want you to do participate with demons.’

Demons Are ‘Elohim’

Deuteronomy 32:15–17 (ESV) — 15 “But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked; you grew fat, stout, and sleek; then he forsook God who made him and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation. 16 They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger. 17 They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded.

• Jeshurun is a poetic term for Israel.
• These verses describe Israel’s backsliding from the Lord.
• They forsook God.
• And they stirred Him to jealousy.
• How did they do it? — with strange ‘Elohim.’
• The Hebrew word ‘strange’ means just that strange, different, illicit, unauthorized, or prohibited.³
• Israel sacrificed to illicit ‘Elohim.’
• Literally, they sacrificed to demons, to ‘elohim’ they had never known.
• So, in Deuteronomy 32:17, demons are classed as ‘elohim’, spirit beings.

No ‘Elohim’ Like Our ‘Elohim’

• Here is what you need to know about your Father God in heaven, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Father of mercies.

1 Kings 8:23 (ESV) — 23 and said, “O LORD, God of Israel, there is no God like you, in heaven above or on earth beneath, keeping covenant and showing steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart;

• There is no God, no ‘elohim’ like our God, like our’ Elohim.’

Psalm 97:9 (ESV) — 9 For you, O LORD, are most high over all the earth; you are exalted far above all gods.

• Our Father God is the Most High ‘Elohim.’

The Most High ‘Elohim’

• There is no higher ‘elohim’ than He because He is the Creator Elohim.

Psalm 89:5–8 (ESV) — 5 Let the heavens praise your wonders, O LORD, your faithfulness in the assembly of the holy ones! 6 For who in the skies can be compared to the LORD? Who among the heavenly beings is like the LORD, 7 a God greatly to be feared in the council of the holy ones, and awesome above all who are around him? 8 O LORD God of hosts, who is mighty as you are, O LORD, with your faithfulness all around you?

• With all of this as a backdrop, now Psalm 82:1 may be a little bit clearer to you.

God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment:

• Capital ‘G’ God is ‘Elohim,’ and the little ‘g’ gods of this verse are also ‘elohim’ in the Hebrew.
• So, the Most God, our Most High Heavenly Father take His place among members of the divine council that he has set up, the members of which are He created.
• He created them as ‘elohim,’ and most likely angels.

Who Are You? Man An ‘Elohim’

• What does all of this have to do with knowing who you are?

1 Samuel 28:11–13 (ESV) — 11 Then the woman said, “Whom shall I bring up for you?” He said, “Bring up Samuel for me.” 12 When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice. And the woman said to Saul, “Why have you deceived me? You are Saul.” 13 The king said to her, “Do not be afraid. What do you see?” And the woman said to Saul, “I see a god coming up out of the earth.”

• That word, little ‘g’ god is, you guessed it, is again the word ‘elohim.’
• Now, listen to the rest of this passage.

1 Samuel 28:13–15 (ESV) — 14 He said to her, “What is his appearance?” And she said, “An old man is coming up, and he is wrapped in a robe.” And Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the ground and paid homage. 15 Then Samuel said to Saul, “Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up?” Saul answered, “I am in great distress, for the Philistines are warring against me, and God has turned away from me and answers me no more, either by prophets or by dreams. Therefore I have summoned you to tell me what I shall do.”

• According to the Bible, human spirits are ‘elohim.’

Who Are You? Human Spirits Are ‘Elohim’

• Saul saw Samuel.
• He knew that it was Samuel, and the word says, ‘he bowed with his face to the ground and paid homage.’
• How could he have seen him, Samuel was dead and buried?
• Saul saw Samuel’s spirit.
• That brings up a point we need to know: what does a human spirit look like? — like you look in the natural.
• Your spirit is as tall as you are tall.
• You don’t have wings as a spirit being.
• Saul recognized Samuel because he knew him on earth.
• He had interactions with Samuel while he was alive.
• Will you recognize one another when you get to heaven? — emphatically yes.
• If you knew one another on earth, you will know one another in heaven.

Moses, Elijah, the Disciples, and Jesus: An Elohim Gathering

• This appearance of Samuel to Saul is not unprecedented in Scripture.

Matthew 17:1–3 (ESV) — 1 And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2 And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. 3 And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him.

• Peter, James, John, and Jesus all saw Moses and Elijah.
• They had been dead for centuries.
• What did they see, they saw these men after the spirit because they are spirits.
• Their bodies had long been decayed.
• So here’s the point.

Who Are You? Man A Human Spirit

• What is man? — the answer? — a human spirit.

1 Thessalonians 5:23 (ESV) — 23 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

• At your central core, you are a spirit being.
• You are an ‘elohim.’
• When you say Jesus came into your heart, what are you saying?
• You are saying that Jesus, by way of the Holy Spirit, joined with your spirit.

In In Search of Myself, D. R. Davies says, “I found myself in finding God. What I was searching for was my own identity, and without knowing it my search was for God.”⁴

Who Are You? Spirit Verses

• Here are some other spirit verses.

Hebrews 4:12 (ESV) — 12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

• Spirit and soul are not the same per this verse in Hebrews four.
• How could they be?
• Spirit and soul can be divided by the Word of God, and if so, they cannot be the same.
• Here’s another spirit verse in Proverbs.

Proverbs 20:27 (ESV) — 27 The spirit of man is the lamp of the LORD, searching all his innermost parts.

• The spirit of man is the tool God uses to communicate with us.
• How does He do it?
• Romans eight clues us in.

Romans 8:16 (ESV) — 16 The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,

Who Are You? Your Spirit Alive to God

• Jesus then gave us a vital spirit verse in His conversation with Nicodemus.

John 3:6 (ESV) — 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

• That which is born of the flesh is your flesh.
• And, that which is born of the Holy Spirit is your human spirit.
• That’s how you understand this verse.
• So, the Word of God is plain on the issue of identity.
• If you desire to know who are, you don’t have to go out into the world and find yourself.
• They don’t have the answer in the first place.
• You are a spirit being made in the likeness of God.
• And, God is the Most High Elohim.
• Now, let’s tie this all together with Jesus’ statement in John ten.

Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’?

• If this passage were written in Hebrew instead of Greek, it would read, ‘Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are ‘elohim?’

So, Jesus went on to say, If God the Father called them ‘elohim’ to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of Elohim’?

Who Are You? The Family of ‘Elohim’

• God the Father is ‘Elohim.’
• He is the number one’ Elohim.’
• Jesus, the Son, is ‘Elohim.’
• And guess what? — God, the Father, called you ‘elohim.’
• Why not?
• After all, aren’t you made in His image and His likeness per Genesis 1:26?
• So, no more trying to scour the galaxy trying to find out who you are.
• Genesis 1:26 is a powerful verse.
• Why? — because in that verse, you have identity and purpose mixed in the same verse.
• You can know both who you and understand your purpose on planet earth.
• I’ll read that verse to you as we close.

Genesis 1:26 (ESV) — 26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

• Your purpose as an image-bearer is too exercise authority over your world and establish God’s kingdom on earth.
• You guys have a great God week, and we will see you next time for another edition of Light on Life.

Why Believing and Abiding Is the Key to the Happy Life

---

References: