About the Book

“Identity crisis” might be too strong a phrase for what you’re feeling, but it’s close. Life isn’t going how you hoped, and you’re not sure what to expect anymore. The core of who you are feels unstable, and you probably can’t even pinpoint why.

What you’re experiencing is identity pressure.

With wit, wisdom and clarity, Justin Poythress helps you make sense of what you’re feeling and offers a biblical path to lasting identity confidence by explaining…

  • How philosophy has impacted the modern understanding of self
  • Why your identity feels shaky
  • How the Bible can transform your sense of self
  • Three principles for living in the identity Jesus gives you

When you build your identity in Christ, you’ll experience clarity, discover your unwavering purpose and move forward with confidence.

Endorsements & Reviews

Who Am I and What Am I Doing with My Life? is a steady and trustworthy revealing of God’s answer to the question aglow within each one of us: Who am I? It is deeply wise and pervasively insightful. I will be using this book in my life and ministry.

Dane Ortlund

Author, Gentle and Lowly; Lead Pastor, Naperville Presbyterian

To live in the modern world is to be faced with endless possibilities: to be steeped in ready-made answers to the question, ‘Who am I?’ This book takes up many of the central questions which all of us face in forming an identity and reframes them by placing Christ at the center. With remarkable warmth, wisdom, and generosity, Justin Poythress encourages readers to embrace a fullness of identity and purpose: a fullness unique to each person, yet one reflecting the fullness of the one who called each of us into being.

Karen Swallow Prior

Author, You Have a Calling

There are few matters more important to young adults than establishing their identity. Yet, in today’s culture and climate, there are few matters that are more confusing. Justin Poythress’s book will help readers find stability and purpose, not in custom-crafting an identity from the myriad of options available to them but by grounding it firmly and faithfully in the Lord Jesus Christ. This book will prove a trusted guide to anyone who is wrestling through who they are and who God has made them to be.

Tim Challies

Author, Seasons of Sorrow

Engaging, accessible, and biblically faithful. Justin has a pastoral heart and a rooted sense of the real spiritual issues we encounter with our identity. In a culture drowning in expressivism, this book is a life raft. We will only ever know ourselves as we come to know and love Jesus, whose Spirit transforms us into the most beautiful version of ourselves. May this book be a welcome call to daily put on your Jesus-self and put off your sinful self. The more you apply
that biblical counsel, the more you will find peace in being yourself: a self for whom God has great purposes and plans.

Pierce Taylor Hibbs

Senior Writer, Westminster Theological Seminary

Justin Poythress is careful in his thinking and full of care for the reader—truthful and gentle and biblical. He deals forthrightly with the felt questions of identity, addressing those matters that weigh on people’s hearts and minds, and he does so by constantly turning the reader’s attention to biblical truths and invitations. At times this book is uncomfortable because of how it presses against our desires and inclinations, but it consistently moves the reader toward formation by Christ and identity in him. This book will strengthen and help any reader who approaches it in humility and good faith.

Barnabas Piper

Author, Hoping for Happiness; Assistant Pastor, Immanuel Nashville

Justin Poythress extends a warm invitation to the transforming freedom of immersing ourselves in our master identity in Christ. Gift this title to your favorite aimless twenty-something—but only after you sneak a read yourself.

Holly Mackle

Host, Unseriously podcast

Justin Poythress biblically tackles what our culture seems to be continually obsessed with—identity. He has written a gospel antidote to the poisonous cultural fascination of searching inside yourself to discover your true identity. This book will be enormously helpful to any follower of Christ who wrestles with important questions about who they are and what in the world they’re supposed to be doing.

Shelby Abbott

Author; Speaker (Campus Ministries)

Justin has given us a valuable contribution to the literature on finding your identity in Jesus. He explains, in simple terms, the philosophies and narratives of the past and present while subjecting them to a biblical analysis, and then goes on to offer a good framework for a pathway forward.

Matt Fuller

Author, Be True to Yourself; Senior Minister, Christ church Mayfair, London

Available at the Following Retailers:

Details

The Good Book Company (April 1, 2026)

Paperback, 160 pages

ISBN: 9781802544183

Justin Poythress

More from Justin

Explore more from Justin through his Time & Chance blog and sermons.