Be Owned and Blessed, Not Burned Out
Owned—in the Best Way Possible
You’ve probably heard some good old-fashioned trash talk in sports: “I own you!” It’s meant to intimidate, to send the message that the other person has no chance unless you allow it. Being “owned” in that context is humiliating—it implies domination and defeat.
But being “owned” by God? That’s something entirely different—and deeply freeing.
The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6:19–20, “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.” That price was the life of God’s Son, given as a ransom to free us from the bondage of sin. Through Jesus, we’ve been rescued from darkness and brought into a Kingdom of light, life, and righteousness.
But here’s the key: living in that freedom means embracing this new identity. You are no longer your own—you belong to Him.
God’s Treasured Possession
Three times in the book of Deuteronomy, God refers to His people as His “treasured possession.” In today’s world, being called a possession might sound negative—li...
Surface Shame and Live Free
What is your experience of shame? Usually we don’t recognize the ways shame affects us. It lurks well under the surface of our lives stealthily affecting our decision making and actions.Â
Shame can be defined many ways, but let's think of it as humiliation or distress that attaches to a person’s identity as result of wrong or foolish thought or behavior. These thoughts and behaviors can be our own or those of another toward us.Â
Adam and Eve were described in the Garden as naked, yet without shame before God or each other. (Genesis 2:25) However, after their sinful rebellion (the Fall) all people throughout history have struggled with shame-infected identities.
Shame is closely tied to feelings and fears, primarily the fear of being found out as flawed, weak, a failure or morally wrong. It leads people – as it did Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 - to hide from each other and/or from God. We hide so we won’t be found out. The more shame we feel, the more of ourselves we hide from ourselve...
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