I have a friend who grew up with a lot of Korean friends. He himself was Chinese. He told me a story once of when he was in 5th grade. At the time, he still didn’t know that there were other Asians besides Chinese and Japanese. As a result, he had a quite comical dialogue when his friend told him he was Korean:

Korean friend: I’m Korean.

My friend: What!? What’s that? What’s a Korean? No, no, no, you’re just confused. You’re Chinese.

Korean friend: No, I’m Korean!

My friend: No, you’re confused! You’re Chinese!

Korean friend: I’M KOREAN!

My friend: YOU’RE CHINESE!

As funny as this is (and slightly racist), my point isn’t to show how ignorant my friend was in 5th grade.

One of my other friends recently reblogged a quote from J.I. Packer about how when we as Christians fall into sin, we are suffering from an identity crisis. And for some odd reason, this just seemed to click so well with my friends story.

When we sin, we have a similar dialogue:

Me: I’m a sinner

God: What!? What are you talking about. You’re my child.

Me: No, I’m a sinner!

God: No, you’re confused! You’re my child!

Me: I’M A SINNER!

God: YOU’RE MY CHILD!

Now the analogy might not work out perfectly, but I think you get my point. We think we’re sinners who are still in bondage. We think we can’t ever be free of sin. But really, we’re just confused. Because we’ve already been freed. We’ve already been forgiven. And we’re REALLY…beloved children of God.