Identity Crisis: Who Am I, Really? shares my journey from abandonment and anger to spiritual renewal, offering readers a thoughtful, faith-centered examination of identity. Why was this an important book for me to write?

Writing Identity Crisis: Who Am I, Really? was profoundly important because my personal journey from confusion about who I truly was to clarity about my ultimate identity mirrors a struggle that I believe is universal. The book is the story of how God took me—a man defined by the lies of his past, which was marked by abandonment, neglect, and abuse—and taught me who I truly was.

My motivation stemmed from my understanding that the “spiritual chains” that bound my heart were from society’s definition of who I was, and the deepest help I could offer to others was to show them the path away from this cobweb trap. I wanted to give my readers the euphoria of their own enlightened journey from a life of angry entitlement to one of humble gratitude, from anxious performance to restful security. By surrendering my story to the “divine Author,” I found that my entire path from early childhood, including my former orphanhood, abuse, and anger, could be transformed into the very tools of faith that could help others discover their own freedom. In short, the book was necessary for me to share – I felt a deep obligation to offer a roadmap that others might use on their quests for their own true identities.

What were some ideas that were important for me to share in this book?

I emphasized several foundational, Christ-centered ideas designed to dismantle a performance-based identity in favor of establishing true self-worth in God’s love. Key ideas that are important for me to share include:

• Identity is Found in Divine Design, Not Self-Creation: The central truth is that everyone’s identity must begin with the Creator, rooted in the Bible telling us we were created in the Imago Dei (Image of God). This inherent value is endowed, intrinsic, and immutable, and it cannot be increased by success or diminished by failure. True self-discovery comes not from looking inward, but from looking up to the Creator.
• The Radical Nature of Divine Adoption: A paramount idea is that as a believer, I am not merely forgiven, but am legally and lovingly adopted as a child of God. This concept, drawn from the irreversible Greco-Roman legal practice of huiothesia, means my old debts and legal ties have been erased, and I gain all the rights of a natural-born heir. This status is permanent, unbreakable, and the ultimate antidote to spiritual orphanhood and shame.
• The Freedom of Resting in Christ’s Finished Work: Crucially, the book aims to show that the only remedy for the soul-crushing performance trap is the reader learning how their identity is obtained by stripping away old facades with the freedom obtained through grace. Their righteousness is not earned but imputed (credited) to their accounts through the substitutionary work of Christ on the cross. Because Christ bore the divine wrath, each and every one of us is given the credit of having rendered perfect obedience to the law and thus is declared righteous by God. No earthly accomplishment can achieve that! Our standing is secured by Christ’s perfection, not our own, and certainly not by how we are evaluated or judged by others.
• The Battle for the Mind: It is essential for readers to understand that the enemy’s primary tactic is deception, accusation, and distortion of truth. This will never go away, and so our ongoing work is to continuously renew our minds by demolishing all the strongholds of lies and replacing them with the truth of God’s Word. My book shows how we can do this through Scripture, prayer, and community.

What was the most challenging part of writing your memoir, and what was the most rewarding?

• Most Challenging: The most difficult aspect involved confronting, and then allowing myself the vulnerability of exposing, the raw experiences of my childhood—the horrible feelings of abandonment and being neglected by those who were supposed to love andcare for me, the “searing, silent language” of being branded with negative names, and myabsolute, deep-seated anger toward God for all of it. It was very difficult going back to reveal this journey, all the way from being an unwanted foster child to my role, striving to become a respected police officer who was trying to earn his own sense of worth, all the while finding a way to silence those “old, familiar names” with all their various earthbound identities. This process required immense spiritual meditation and emotional honesty.
• Most Rewarding: The most rewarding element was clearly the process of discovering and then presenting to others the glorious truth of my new identity in Christ. This “new journey” transformed my path from a life of anxious performance to one of a restful and secure identity. The reward turned out to be knowing that my most painful chapters—my orphanhood and abuse—were used by God to give others a “roadmap” to their own God-given identity and the freedom which comes from their true name as a child of the King.

What do you hope is one thing readers take away from your story?

The single most important takeaway I hope for my readers is that they will understand they are created in God’s image and must stop searching for any identity in worldly evaluations, that by stripping away secular manifestations of identity, they can immediately reveal the truth of their own perfect identity already given to them through God’s love and sovereign design.

I am praying that my readers will: 

• Hear God’s quiet and still voice, which cuts through every one of the competing voices.
• See themselves as God sees them: not as an orphan, but as a legal heir and child of the King.
• Understand at their core that their identity is not bound to anything from their past or anything related to achievement or performance, but that they are seen as righteous and deserving in God’s sight, forgiven and freed through the actions of His Son.

My final call to action is for readers to reject the exhausting slavery of performance and step into the joyful freedom of grace, living fully in the light of their true identity in His name, and now theirs, as well.

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