Making Choices From Your Real Identity by Graham Cooke

Knowing who you want to be is an identity issue. Knowing what you want to do is concerned with destiny. Both are two sides of the same coin. They cannot be separated.

Both require choices to be made that are premeditated and predetermined. Choices are the root of power and that level of ascendancy is never, ever spontaneous. You cannot drift to the top of a mountain. Pipe dreams are not for players but for the spectators in life. Real dreaming produces purposeful living in the present and takes hold of the future in the form of choices.

We make choices for now and we make preferences that guarantee a different future. Along with those choices are always the issues of identity, destiny, self-control, passion and power.

In 1974 I received four prophetic words that have guided my life for more than three decades. One of them was concerned with the gift of prophecy; the office of a prophet; running schools of prophecy and writing a series of books that would be considered classics on the subject of prophecy.

I was told also that this particular spiritual gift would bring me life and death; friends and enemies; blessings and curses. I would be loved and hated; celebrated and maligned; received and rejected; called authentic and written off as apostate, all in the name of Jesus.

I was twenty-one years old when this burden was laid on me. At that time I had not even moved in the gift of prophecy. Thirty-seven years later, all those words have come to pass. I’m still growing in the ministry and I have the scars to prove it.

At every step of this road choices have been made regarding the journey. In the early days I was not accustomed to making choices based upon my identity or destiny. I drifted through jobs, taking the line of least resistance. I was praying for something to happen but not purposing. A vision without a plan is just wishful thinking. My indecision was costly, it added years to my development. Eventually people who believed in me got tough with me. Making choices in line with how the Lord viewed me opened me up to His Passion for me. He is passionate about me being in the prophetic. The turning point was me receiving His passion for me and embracing it as my own.

I cannot tell you how many times I have chosen His viewpoint on my identity and eventually made it my own. I am destined to do the things I have done in His name because I chose the outcome that He wished to create for me. Following that path of His choosing forces me to make other decisions regarding what I had to give up in order to stay the course. People around us make decisions too. No choices are made in a vacuum. All we can do is turn our scars into trophies and wear them with sorrow and gladness.

I made choices to study, listen, practice and pursue the gift relentlessly. Those decisions have defined who I am and what I am called to accomplish. Identity and destiny are the outworking of such outcomes.

I have spent money that I did not have. Used time that others spent for sleeping. Travelled tens of thousands of miles believing for a provision to get me where I needed to go. I have given away enough money to buy homes and land several times over. Sow where you want to go.

When you know who you want to be and what you want to do you must make choices in line with the outcome that God is creating. Embrace the life you want as a gift from God. The passion that you receive will provide the impetus for the sacrifices you must make.

You must think for yourself. To do that effectively you must have an understanding of who you are personally in Christ. If you have no understanding of the meaning and purpose for your own life, you cannot affect anything long term. What you think must be written down first. Then you must use it to pray, ponder and plan your way.

Life never just happens. It’s planned.