Summary
Who Am I? "AM and AM NOT"
"Who am I?" is one of the oldest questions a human being can ask, and it surfaces at every stage of life—when convictions shift, when a job ends, when the last child leaves home, when a spouse dies, when the ground beneath our identity suddenly feels less firm. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, awaiting execution in a Nazi prison, wrote a poem by that very title, wrestling with the gap between how others perceived him and how he knew himself from within. The question is real, but it cannot be answered by self-reflection. It can only be answered by divine revelation.
What God reveals in His Word is twofold and unflinching. First, we are sinners through and through—in thought, word, and deed, in what we have done and left undone—deserving His eternal condemnation. Second, in grace and mercy God has redeemed us through the cross and shed blood of Christ, a sacrifice the Father accepted, as the empty tomb declares. That victory is delivered to us in the waters of Holy Baptism, where we are washed in His promises and given a new identity: a baptized child of God. We so often define ourselves by what we do—teacher, truck driver, homemaker—and add "Christian" as a label. The order is reversed in the Gospel. You are a Christian; everything else is what you happen to be doing.
The positive side of this identity rests on a great negative: God is God, and we are not. In John 8:48–59, a hostile exchange reaches its climax when Jesus declares, "Before Abraham was, I am." His hearers immediately picked up stones, because they understood exactly what He had said. He was not merely claiming great age; He was speaking the divine name revealed at the burning bush in Exodus 3:13–14: "I AM WHO I AM." Luther observed that in this name God communicates that He simply is—not a "has been," not a "will be," but utterly self-sufficient, dependent on nothing, timeless, constant, unchangeable. Jesus, in plain words, was claiming to be God in the flesh.
We do not pick up literal stones, but we still hurl them. The temptation in Genesis 3 was that Adam and Eve would "be like God," and that ancient sin keeps replaying in us. We act like God when we believe we can control everything, solve every difficulty by our own ingenuity, know everything, be everywhere, and bend every outcome to our will. We play at being omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. But the morning light needs only a moment to remind us: God is the great I AM, and we are small-case "I am not."
This "I am not" is not a put-down; it is part of the truth that frees us. The Lord Jesus Christ went to the cross bearing every sin—including our repeated attempts to be God in our own lives—paying the debt, reconciling us, buying us back. Through His Word He keeps reminding us that He is God and we are not, and through Baptism He keeps giving us the identity that no job loss, empty nest, grief, or shifting self-perception can erase.
Bonhoeffer's poem ends where every Christian's wrestling with identity finally lands. After turning over the perceptions of others and his own self-doubt, he simply lets them go: "Whoever I am, Thou knowest, O God, I am Thine." That is the answer. You are forgiven, loved, redeemed, and claimed in the waters of Baptism. That is who you are—because He is God, and we are not. For the full treatment, see Who am I? "AM and Am Not" 9-14-25.
Video citations
- Who am I? "AM and Am Not” 9-14-25 — Jesus is Lord and we can run into the arms of God. Receive O Lord the praise of your people. As we open up your Word, we are confident that the voice that we hear is your voice. And we proclaim…