You Are Valued

You Are Valued

Scripture: Luke 12:6-7, Proverbs 27:21; Romans 8:2

Good morning Strangers Rest. The title of my message this morning is “You Are Valued.” Now I recognize that there is no great new revelation captioned in that title, but God wants us to know this morning we are worth something to Him. I don’t care if everyone around us has written us off and have determined our worth (to them) based on their assessment of us, God values us in a special way and the way He values us has nothing to do with our status in society. Graduates, I especially want you to know that you can accomplish a lot in this life; make a lot of money and get a lot of letters after your name, but that is not what God values when He calls you His own. And graduates, you should allow no one to define your worth. When you allow this to happen, you give others the power and authority to define you and that should not happen. Each of you must know and understand your value – what you are bringing to a personal relationship and what you are bringing to your chosen field of study or career.

Our Father values us because He created man in the beginning but after man fell, God gave His only Son to die on a cross so that He could reestablish the fellowship He had with man before man sinned. God values each and every one of us. We are His children and His heart’s desire is for each of us to love, honor, and obey Him. So the question this morning is this: if God values us so greatly, should we not also value one another as God values us? As His children, should we not value what God values? Now I want to make a statement to set the stage for the rest of this message: “We place a value on things based on what we are willing to give up in order to obtain it.” That includes the personal relationships we have to the things we choose to purchase for our comfort. In both situations we choose to give up something for the relationship or for the product. I will come back to this shortly.

In the twelfth chapter of the book of Luke, Jesus tells His disciples how deeply God knows and cares about us. He says in verses six, seven and twenty-four: “(6) Are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins? And not one of them is forgotten before God. (7) But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows….(24) Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap, which have neither storehouse nor barn; and God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds?” (Luke 12:6-7, 24)

Webster’s dictionary defines the word value as, “the monetary worth of something; relative worth, utility or importance.” Please keep this definition in mind as I go through this message. This definition captures four distinct differences that I believe demonstrates how God values us. First is the “monetary worth of something.” You will hear later how God paid a price and purchased us from our former owner. Second is the term “relative worth.” Relative worth is a method of determining the worth, or value, of something by considering its value to similar assets. When we became God’s children our value to Him went up exponentially as compared to who we were previously. Then we find the terms “utility or importance.” With this, the difference shifts to why we are of value – our utility or importance to God. You will hear in this message that God has empowered us to do certain things for His kingdom. So, Webster’s definition of the word value as, “the monetary worth of something; relative worth, utility or importance,” in my opinion, captures how God values us and the reasons why He values us. God created everything that exists on the earth so we can assume that He values everything that He created. But what we see in the verses from Luke chapter twelve is what God values most out of everything that He has created is you and me. Jesus told His disciples that God knew, to the exact number, how many hairs were on their heads. Furthermore, because they were most valuable to Him, they did not need to worry about the things of this life. What Jesus told His disciples also applies to each of us!

I want to go back to what I said at the beginning, about how we place a value on things based on what we are willing to give up in order to obtain them. When you walk into a grocery store to purchase your groceries, every item in the store has a price tag on it which lets you know what it will cost you to purchase the item. Price is defined as the “the cost of something brought or sold; something sacrificed to get something else.” When you find the items you are searching for, if you accept the price the store is requesting for the item and deem that the price does not exceed the item’s value to you, then you make the choice to give up (sacrifice) your money in order to obtain the items that you desire. While this is a normal day to day activity for all of us, I want to ask you a question: “Is the price of something the same as its value?” Just because something is a certain price, does that equate to its value? The owner of a product determines what they are willing to sell the product for based on what it cost them to obtain it or what it cost them to make it plus a percentage increase that provides them a profit. So the owner of the product establishes the price, but do they also establish the value?