I have always been a 'car guy.' I have had a serious interest in them for as long as I can remember. I also worked in the Automobile Industry and wrenched on so many vehicles I owned over the years that I have lost count.
Countless years ago, when I was a teenager, I had a car that was stolen and stripped of the things I had added to it to make it unique. Periodically, after that, I would have a dream about the theft of that car. I would find myself getting really disturbed and upset as if it had just happened.
After having one of those dreams again the umpteenth time, I decided to look into the contents of the dream. I discovered dreaming that your car has been stolen could indicate that a person is being stripped of their identity due to a failed relationship, or losing a job, or something that was causing a change in their identity.
As I considered the information I read, I started to understand what my dream meant. I realized that each time I had this dream, I was feeling like an outsider in my own life who had become trapped and entangled in circumstances that were controlling me rather than me controlling them. I would feel as if my identity had been stolen. Those times when I felt this way were during huge challenges in my personal and spiritual life.
After years of just shrugging off the dreams and the impact they had on me, I decided to do some honest evaluation of myself and try to understand my feelings and emotions to overcome their effect.
After researching this subject, I would define the term "identity theft" as when a person feels their life is slowly dissolving away due do circumstances outside of their control, or they are beginning to question who they are and what they stand for, losing their sense of self.
People who feel a deep emptiness or a great deal of self-doubt can also feel as if their identity is being stolen. This can lead to conflicts in relationships and unhealthy emotional expressions. For the Christian, this can occur most often when the Holy Spirit is working diligently to replace parts of the old sinful habits and thought patterns with new sanctified habits.
In today's world, many people are spending a great deal of time trying to figure out just who they are, and then, when they do "discover" who they are, they have a hard time dealing with the reality of what they find! The Bible says that the human "heart is deceitful and desperately wicked" (Jer 17:9). The Bible also tells us that it is the Holy Spirit who begins a new transforming work within a person at the moment there is a commitment to follow Jesus and they become Born-Again (John 3:3; 2 Cor 3:18). It is the application of that work that becomes the real challenge.
So many Christians are content to just get forgiven and go to Heaven when they die! And that's great, except for the fact that because they are going to Heaven, they often think that they can ignore and avoid dealing with life's many problems in the here and now! When they find themselves challenged by life's stresses and pressures, they think they can emotionally and psychologically avoid dealing with those problems by just "hoping for the day of the Lord's appearing" when they are 'raptured' out of the nightmare of their life. This makes it really easy to avoid having to confront their present reality.
Identity Crisis
Identity, or psychological identity, is a person's capacity for self-reflection and awareness. Some people acquire their identities through the tasks they do and the objects they identify themselves with. Others may find their identity in what they wear, what they own, how they look, where they live, or what kind of car they drive.
Men often find their identity in the job they have or the work they do. Women often find it through personal and family relationships. Ultimately, the Born-Again Christian must identify themselves with Jesus alone and what He has done for them, not in what they have done for Him because salvation is about what He already did, and not what we could ever do.
Identity Crisis is a psychological term that describes someone who is in a state of searching for their identity. It can have a significant effect on their self-esteem. A Christian can have an Identity Crisis as they struggle to worship the Holy Trinity of Father, Son, and Spirit, while still worshiping the unholy trinity of me, myself, and I.
That can cause a spiritual, emotional, and even a physical nervous breakdown. When the Holy Spirit begins His supernatural surgery to remove the old nature, the conflict between it and the new nature found in Jesus intensifies as He transforms the Born-Again Christian into the image and likeness of Jesus. The Apostle Paul spoke of this happening to him;
"For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me." (Rom 7:15 ESV)
Paul goes on and expresses his dilemma, "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?" and then proclaims the answer, "Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin" (Rom 7:24-25).
Breaking Down the Barriers of Self
In psychology, it is believed that a nervous breakdown "is an acute emotional or psychological collapse causing the inability to cope. They are often the result of chronic and unrelenting emotional stress such as chronic and unresolved grief, unemployment, career changes, stress from school, and other work-related stress. Serious or chronic illness in a family member, the death of a family member, and other sudden major life changes such as divorce, separation, and relationship problems were more likely to cause the feeling of an impending nervous breakdown in the most recent survey." (American Psychologist 2000;55)
When the time comes for the Holy Spirit to focus on eradicating within the Christian specific parts of the old nature that are currently hindering deeper growth and relationship with Jesus, the person who fights against them and refuses the wooing of God may turn to things that can cause irreparable damage to their self, as well as to those around them, as they slowly spiral out of control. The dying process from the old nature identity to the new can be tumultuous, to say the least.
A Positive Emotional Breakdown
Because of many unnerving events, specifically dramatic experiences and chronic health issues of loved ones affecting my life, my beliefs were seriously shaken. I questioned everything I had learned from my Pastors and Professors. As my life unraveled in bits and pieces during each event, some lasting decades, I would compartmentalize things and mentally stuff them in emotional closets along the hallway of my life.
A secular Psychologist would say I may have had an emotional breakdown. As the multiple challenges and their effects became more intense, I couldn't pretend anymore that things were OK and that I was strong enough to hold my life together.
The problem with throwing things in mental closets and forcing the door shut is that they would ultimately end up bursting open on the path down the hallway of my life, tripping me up and hindering me from experiencing the peace beyond comprehension and freedom found only in Jesus.
I later realized I had been forced to begin moving closer to the end of myself. I was losing the ability to hide my feelings. My emotional control was finally getting broken, and I started to get in touch with them, resulting in my core identity in Jesus emerging. As a result, the ability to navigate the endless stormy waters of life became more manageable.
Every Born-Again Christian who wants to live a supernatural life must choose, as Paul the Apostle, to:
"press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me."… "…Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." (Phil 3:12-14 NIV)
When a Christian is going through painful transition periods, they can feel as if they are having an "emotional breakdown" or an emotional/spiritual "crisis." That is most likely a result of the Holy Spirit working on transforming the old nature's dysfunctional personality patterns that were formed from childhood into the healthy and true core identity of the new nature found in Jesus alone.
The old nature of SELF is shed like a snakeskin. During the painful shedding process, it can feel disorienting and confusing. The enemy will attempt to inflict fearful thoughts and try to lead the Christian to believe that they are going crazy.
However, it is not the enemy but rather the Holy Spirit who is actively working at developing the new personality and helping them leave behind their "childish ways" of the past (See 1 Cor 13:11-12).
While the old nature is disintegrating, the new nature is waiting to be released from the tomb. When that happens, the power of the resurrection will be released into their life, and they will begin living beyond the supernatural.
