There is a distinction in what you own and what you possess. You can own the most beautiful house in the world with the finest luxuries, yet not possess a home. You can have a marriage in that looks perfect and functioning, but yet not possess true love. You can have gained the highest degree possible, but still not possess wisdom.
Ownership is not possession. Possession is living fully into the potential that a situation, relationship, or object has. It is bringing something fully alive or fully into the potential that God has placed in it.
I will admit sometimes, I get caught up in ownership. Or in my case, lack of ownership. I have nothing really. I own nothing. By the success-o-meter in place in our world today, I am failing miserably. I'm not married. I don't have kids. I have had several different careers, but nothing established yet. I am certainly not the most successful person in my high school graduating class. Sometimes I get defeated. Sometimes I get depressed or discouraged or caught up in the lack of things I have obtained or succeeded at.
But its then I realize that my perspective is off. I am looking through the wrong lens. I need to fling off my lens of ownership, and look at what I possess.
I am not married, but I know that I have the kind of relationship that doesn't come along every day. I may not be have "owned" that standard yet, but I am possessing the kind of relationship that books are written about.
I don't have kids of my own. I don't "own" that either. But I have had the incredible privilege and opportunity of being part of so many kids lives and I have "possessed" that in a way that few people will ever get to.
I don't have a degree or a career. I don't "own" that kind of success. But I have a vast array of experiences that have brought me to where I am and readied me for the life I am possessing.
I don't "own" a house, but I possess a home that is not dependent on a structure. My home is my family. It is with the people I love and regardless of what location or address we are in.
Ownership is not possession. Success is not triumph. Marking things off the list of what is expected, is not living life.
I have nothing, but actually, I have it all. Or as the apostle Paul said "as having nothing, yet possessing all things" (2 Corinthians 6.10)
