Your Worth is Far Above Rubies!

I have been learning some wonderful things on how to find the value in yourself.  If you are like me, you have one area of your life that makes you feel lower than dirt.  It could be that you don't have as much money as you would like, your past could be a bit dodgy, your skin color may be darker than you would like, or you may be heavier than most people consider appropriate.  All these things can make you feel less valuable than you really are.  So what is the true measure of your value as a person?

According to the devotional I read through today with Joel Osteen, the true measure of my value can be found in God.  God found me so valuable that he sent his only begotten son to come and die so that he could have me. Hence Paul says "You were bought with a High Price" and that price is the blood and death of God's son Jesus.  That said, my value is defined by that act of self sacrifice and not by how much money I have, how beautiful I am, how brilliant and all the other things by which we define our worth.

I don't have to struggle to be accepted and found worthy by God.  I am already accepted in the beloved.  I am so valuable that before God ever said that first "Let there be" he had thought of me, planned my existence, how I would live my life, what I would look like, how much I would weigh etc... and he chose me!  Can you imagine that? (Ephesians 1:4, Psalm 139:16) Every single aspect of you was carefully thought out by God.  Why then do people feel the need to point out things about you and say "This is not good?"  I dare say that it is all good.  All of it.  Even your weaknesses and your mistakes may have been meant by the enemy for evil but God means them for good.  How comforting!!!

It takes the burden from us and puts it on God.  So I don't have to make all A's in school to be worth something.  I don't have to look like a model to be acceptable and lovable.  I don't have to have a certain net worth to actually have value.  I just have to be me.  The person God created me to be.  The person I naturally gravitate to when I am in the Lord.  That's all there is to it. 

Just as salvation is not by works, our acceptance in the beloved is also not by works.  We receive it in faith.  Our value is not by works.  It is received by faith.  I am valuable.  My worth is far above rubies not because of what I look like or what I can do, but because God says so!  He thought so highly of me that he sent his son Jesus to be nailed on the cross so that I can be his.  And if God could literally die to have me, then if man cannot see my worth I think its his loss!  

Don't let anyone or anything else define your worth.  Only your creator, who knows what he has put in you, can do that.  He says you are beautiful, talented, creative, to die for, your worth is far above rubies, you are too valuable!!  Priceless!!   You are a gem!!