We started a new. series at Gateway in Austin.
In our world, it’s really easy to define ourselves by our relationship status or season of life; married, single, divorced, dating, starting over, starting out. Those labels can start to feel like our identity. But what if your life is bigger than your current chapter?
Your identity isn’t based on your past mistakes, your current status, or what didn’t work out. It’s based on the idea that you are loved, pursued, and restored by God.
And if that’s true, then no matter where you are today, your story isn’t stuck. It’s not defined by what’s broken. It’s moving toward wholeness.
Digging Deeper:
Message Video:
Message Audio:
Message Notes by Carlos Ortiz, Jr.:
I don’t know about you, but I’m a sucker for period piece movies or shows. There’s something about a place and time before me, its history, the fashion, the context and the language, that draws me in. Especially the language, because words evolve, the use of those words evolve, but the true meaning of the word itself does not.
I was wondering about our own English language and words that have meaning but are rarely used in everyday conversations. I ran across this article that was titled, “50 Rarely Used Words That Are Good to Know.” Let’s see how many of these you know:
Acumen Bastion Behoove Conundrum Edify
Egregious Impetus Metanoia Sanguine
Then there’s the word Redeem. Now we do use the word redeem mostly for transactional opportunities. You can redeem this ticket for a ride at the fair or the carnival. You missed the shot, but you redeemed yourself by making the next one.
Redeem – to buy back, to repair or restore, to make better, to remove obligation of payment
But what about Redeem, when it comes to us and God?
Well, one of the first times in scripture we hear of this reference is in Exodus 6.
6 “Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. 7 I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians.
This is God saying, I will rescue you from being a slave, and will draw you to me. You are mine, you no longer belong to the Egyptians.
The Hebrew word here for Redeemed is ga’al, and it’s a word we see quite often in the old testament (105 times) and the verb always moves toward release from loss, debt, slavery, or death and toward restored wholeness inside the covenant community.
Then we see the growth of the word Redeemed as we continue to see God’s story evolve (104 references), and Redeemed shows up as
Kaphar – To cover, to atone, to make reconciliation, to purge
The word Redeemed continues to have more depth and meaning as we read in the New Testament. And much like the etymology of a word like redemption has a story, so do we. We have a story, maybe it is an intentional one, or maybe it is one that happened to us, but we all have one.
Every one of us grows up inside a story. Some of us grew up in homes that were warm and stable. Others grew up in homes that were chaotic, absent, or painful. Some grew up with parents who were married, some with a single parent, some with step-parents, and some with no parents at all. And whether we realize it or not, those stories form us. They shape how we trust, how we attach, how we handle conflict, how we view intimacy, and how we imagine love.
But here’s the problem: Most of us think we are far more “free” than we actually are.
We assume we are choosing our relationships, our habits, our values. But the reality is that much of what we do in relationships is not chosen—it’s inherited. We repeat what we saw. We reenact what we learned. We internalize what was modeled.
And the Bible tells us something deeply unsettling but also deeply hopeful: you are not just shaped by your family of origin—you are shaped by a much older family story. A story that goes all the way back to Genesis. A story about God’s design, humanity’s rebellion, relational brokenness, and God’s relentless pursuit of redemption.
The question for us is not: “Did my family shape me?”
The real question is: “Which story is ultimately defining me—my family’s story or God’s redemptive story?”
God’s Design Was Perfect Relationship
The Bible does not begin with rules. It begins with relationships.
In Genesis 1 and 2 and later explained in more detail in John 1, before there is sin, before there is shame, before there is fear, we see God existing eternally as Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Perfect unity. Perfect love. Perfect self-giving relationship.
God didn’t create humans because He was lonely. He created humans to share in the love He already had.
So humanity is created not merely to obey God, but to walk with Him. To experience intimacy with God and harmony with one another. Adam and Eve are naked and unashamed—not just physically, but emotionally, spiritually, relationally. There is no hiding. No fear. No power struggle. No manipulation. No insecurity.
In other words, God’s original design for human life is this:
Deep connection with God that flows into healthy connection with others.
This is crucial. Because when we talk about relationships—dating, marriage, sexuality, friendship—the Bible never starts with behavior. It starts with identity. It starts with belonging. It starts with communion.
We were designed for:
Secure attachment
Mutual self-giving
Trust without fear
Love without performance
Which means broken relationships are not just inconvenient. They are unnatural. They are not how things are supposed to be.
But then Genesis 3 happens.
Sin Distorts Both Vertical and Horizontal Relationships
Genesis 3 is not simply the story of rule-breaking. It’s the story of relational collapse.
Adam and Eve decide they want to define good and evil for themselves. They want autonomy instead of trust. They want control instead of dependence. And the moment sin enters, everything fractures.
First, their relationship with God changes. They hide. They feel shame. They are afraid.
Then their relationship with each other changes. Adam blames Eve. Eve deflects responsibility.
Then their relationship with themselves changes. They become self-conscious, insecure, and exposed.
Sin doesn’t just make us bad.
Sin makes us defensive, fearful, and self-protective.
And that brokenness doesn’t stay contained within one generation.
Genesis 4 shows us the next step in the story: the first family produces the first murder. Cain and Abel. Jealousy. Rivalry. Violence. Alienation.
What we see is this:
unredeemed brokenness becomes generational.
The Bible is brutally honest about this. Sin doesn’t just affect individuals. It creates patterns. Cycles. Scripts that get passed down. Brokenness becomes systemic.
This is why some of us grew up in families marked by:
Emotional distance
Explosive anger
Addiction
Abandonment
Control
Silence
Chaos
And even when we swear, “I’ll never be like my parents,” we often end up reproducing the same emotional patterns—just in different forms.
Why? Because unhealed wounds don’t disappear.
They get transmitted.
We either repeat what we experienced, or we react against it—but either way, it still defines us.
The Bible calls this the problem of not “mastering sin” (Genesis 4:7). Sin is not just something we commit; it is something that wants to rule us. Shape us. Form us.
And here’s the sobering truth:
You can be young.
You can be single.
You can be free from legal constraints.
And still be deeply unfree on the inside.
Because your past is still writing your future.
Redemption Is God’s Way Out of the Cycle
Here is the hope of the Christian story: God does not abandon humanity after the fall. He immediately begins a redemptive plan.
Even in Genesis 3, we see grace:
God covers Adam and Eve’s shame with garments – the first sacrifice found in the Bible.
God promises a future “offspring” who will crush the serpent.
God refuses to leave humanity trapped in their brokenness.
Redemption means:
To be bought back.
To be rescued from bondage.
To be restored to what was lost.
And the entire storyline of the Bible is God stepping into human dysfunction to reverse it. The ark. The exodus. The law. The prophets.
All of it points toward one thing: God coming personally, in Jesus, to redeem not just our behavior—but our identity.
Jesus doesn’t just forgive sins, He re-parents us.
He gives us a new family, and a new story.
And with that new family and story, comes a new inheritance.
Which means your family of origin no longer gets the final word over your life.
Your trauma does not get the final word.
Your mistakes do not get the final word.
Your sexual history does not get the final word.
Your parents’ failures do not get the final word.
Redemption means God interrupts the cycle.
Not by erasing your past, but by reframing it.
Not by denying your wounds, but by healing them.
Not by pretending you weren’t shaped, but by reshaping you from the inside out.
Sexuality and the Body (1 Corinthians 6)
Now Paul brings all of this into one of the most personal areas of human life: sexuality.
In 1 Corinthians 6, Paul is speaking to people who grew up in deeply broken sexual cultures. Sexual exploitation, casual sex, temple prostitution—this was normal. This was inherited. This was learned.
And Paul says something radical:
“Your body is not your own. You were bought with a price.”
Notice what he does not say. He does not say:
“Follow these rules or God won’t love you.”
“Sex is dirty.”
“Desire is bad.”
He says something far deeper to these followers of Jesus:
Your body matters because God lives within it.
Your body is a temple. That means:
God is not distant from your physical life.
God is not indifferent to your relationships.
God is not disconnected from your sexuality.
Sexual sin is not just moral failure. It is identity confusion.
Because when you use your body for self-gratification instead of self-giving love, you are acting as if your body belongs to you.
But redemption says, “I am not my own, I belong to God.”
Which means sexuality is no longer about:
Proving worth
Filling emptiness
Escaping loneliness
Controlling intimacy
It becomes about:
Honoring God
Reflecting covenant love
Participating in restored relationship
Your sexual ethic is not about restriction. It’s about the redemption of desire itself.
Conclusion:
Which Story Is Defining You?
So here’s the real question for us today:
Do you understand how your family shaped you?
Do you see the patterns you inherited?
Do you recognize the scripts you are still living out?
And more importantly:
Have you allowed God’s redemptive story to interrupt them?
Being “young and free” does not mean living without limits.
It means living with a new identity.
Not:
“I am single.”
“I am divorced.”
“I am broken.”
“I am behind.”
But:
“I am redeemed.”
Redeemed means: Your past does not define you.
Your wounds are not wasted.
Your story is still being rewritten.
God is not asking you to survive your season of life.
He is inviting you to be restored within it.
And over the next three weeks, we will explore what redemption looks like in every stage—single, married, hurting, healing.
But it starts here:
Not with changing your relationships.
Not with fixing your behavior.
Not with managing your past.
It starts with receiving a new story.
You are not what happened to you.
You are not what you’ve done.
You are not what you fear.
You are what God has done for you in Christ.
You are redeemed.