Our Worth In The Sight Of God (Longer Sermon)

Most of us need a confidence boost especially when we have to do something new, something different.

Some of us even fail to recognise our worth, the world is very good at putting us down - More often than not, it simply ignores us.

In this kind of world a sense of our own self-worth is difficult to build, and even more difficult to maintain.

Today's Gospel puts that right, Jesus was preparing His disciples for their first mission – something new.

He knew that the world would not treat them any more kindly than it had treated Him.

To prepare them, He reminded them of their personal worth and their importance to God.

He compared them to the birds of the air, sparrows who are the most common birds in the world.

Worthless little creatures? - NO, in God's eyes they are valuable.

Not one of them falls to the ground without His awareness.

Like sparrows, we sometimes feel so small in such a large and indifferent world.

Most people do not even know we exist. And of those who do, how many really care?

Our contributions are so minimal that society could probably get along just as well without us.

If we were to die tomorrow, it would not create so much as a ripple on the pond of life.

Flags would not fly at half-mast and no one would declare a day of public mourning.

Family and a few friends would attend our funeral.

Our place of burial would be duly marked and we would soon be forgotten and the world would carry on without us – as if we never existed.

If that assessment seems morbid, you will have to admit that, for most people it is realistic.

But this is not so with Jesus. He said that to the world sparrows are virtually worthless.

Yet He insisted that not one of them ever falls to the ground without the awareness of His Father.

From that thought Jesus drew this conclusion, "You are worth more than many sparrows."

We may be small, we may be insignificant, but we are important to God.

Like sparrows, we also feel helpless before the storms of nature.

When a hurricane sweeps through an area it destroys everything in its path, leaving a trail of devastation.

If we were to examine one of these sites after the storm.

We would witness death, broken limbs, power lines brought down, damaged or destroyed houses, sometimes full grown trees uprooted.

Looking more closely, we would see small birds lying on the ground – swept up and then thrown down.

Sparrows are born to fly, they are not designed to handle strong winds. Those that are caught in a storm fall to the ground.

Jesus recognised that people fall, just like sparrows and often through no fault of their own.

They are simply victims of things beyond their control.

Life puts more on them than they are designed to handle….. When that happens, they fall.

People fall victims to hunger, diseases, wars, natural calamities, financial and domestic problems, violence and theft.

But Jesus reminds us that disaster does not diminish our worth.

We may feel and be helpless, but we are not forgotten. Jesus said, "Not a single sparrow falls to the ground without your Father's perception."

Through the tragedies of life and sometimes life can be very cruel, life seems to say that we don’t matter, but the fact remains, we do matter to God.

Like sparrows, we also seem so insignificant as to have little or no value.

These days we hear a lot about the endangered species. Some creatures that are near extinction.

When that truth comes to light, those that remain are valuable. Quite obviously, sparrows are not one of those endangered species.

There are millions of them and one sparrow has no value at all. But can the same be said about people?

There are about 5 billion of us here on the earth. How can any one person be considered valuable in the midst of so many?

To answer that question accurately, we must first know who that one person is.

If we are speaking of some nameless, faceless individual, residing somewhere in the slums of Africa, then the answer is obvious.

That person has no real importance to you and to me.

Whatever happens to them will not affect us one way or the other.

We will not even know about it, let alone care about it.

But if that one person is the child who shares our home, then the answer is decidedly different.

We know every detail of that child's life. Anything that happens to them is of first-rate importance to you and to me.

And in many ways that’s the importance of the media especially tv as it brings these situations into our homes.