Who owns you? When I ask myself that question, my first impulse is to dismiss it as nonsensical. With Paul, who enjoyed the rights and freedoms of a Roman citizen, I too can boast that I am free—at least politically.

Olav Olavson was a free citizen of Sweden, but he found himself hardpressed for money. So in desperation he sold his body for medical research to the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm in 1910. A year later, he inherited a fortune, so he tried to buy himself back. But the Institute refused to sell him his rights to his own body, and in a lawsuit they retained possession of it. The Institute even collected damages from him because he had two teeth extracted without permission.

All of us are slaves to sin and spiritually dead—unless we have been born again. We can be set free from the penalty and power of sin (and how I rejoice that I have been set free) by prayerfully asking Jesus Christ to become our Liberator. We experience spiritual freedom as we accept His gift of forgiveness and then offer ourselves as slaves to God (Romans 6:22).

What a blessed paradox! As God's slaves we enjoy a life of true freedom, peace, and hope.  —VCG  — Vernon C. Grounds