Know Your Value
Take out a new crispy $10 bill and ask the students or congregation what you are holding . Ask if anyone would like it. All would raise their hands. Then take a another $10 bill out of your pocket that is dirty and crinkled up and ask what you are holding now. Ask if anyone would like to have it. All would raise their hands again.
Each one of us is so valuable! We were made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27). Just like the $10 bill didn't lose its value and was still worth $10 no matter how dirty it was, so too our value doesn't change even though we may have gotten dirty with sin. We need to look at ourselves through God's eyes, knowing that we are loved, we are chosen, we are the most precious creation of God!
Luke 12:6-7 says "Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God." If God does not forget about the smallest of his creations, he certainly is not going to forget about you his son/daughter.
In 1John 3:1 it says "Behold what manner of love the father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God." We are his children made in his image.
The problem isn't us losing our value (child of god), it's us not realizing our value at times.
Just like the $10 no one minded when I asked the question would you still take the $10 that was all squished up and dirty because the knew the value. The value does not diminish because of the circumstances it was in. It could be a crispy new $10 bill, an old one that is a little ripped, one that is a different older design, one that has been used a lot or a little. They all are worth $10.
My prayer is that you live with the knowledge of knowing your true value and don't let someone else or your circumstances dictate what your value is. The $10 only gets its value from one place: the US Treasury when they printed it. If I told you that the $10 in my hand is actually $5 you wouldn't believe. In that same sense, don't let others or the devil fool you about your true value.
Value Where There Is None
March 23, 2022 (UPI) -- Auction house Sotheby's said it expects to fetch up to $551,000 for an unusual item -- a receipt for a piece of invisible art by French artist Yves Klein.
According to Stoheby’s, “Klein sold numerous pieces of imaginary art, which he dubbed Zones of Immaterial Pictorial Sensibility, in exchange for a weight of pure gold, and he would issue receipts to the buyers."
Oddly enough, Klein (1928-1962) was considered a master of the artistic genre Nouveau Réalisme – New Realism. Yet there is simply nothing “real” about this.
The receipt in question was for a sale of a piece of imaginary art dated December 7, 1959. The receipt will go on auction April 6, 2022, and is expected to fetch the unimaginable price of over a half a million dollars.
Not everything “real” is visible or tangible. Take your soul, for example. It’s not visible or tangible. It can’t be weighed or measured or photographed. But it is, in a true sense, the most real thing about you. And that soul has immeasurable value.
Your soul – YOU – were worth the cost of the life of the Son of God, that you might enter into eternal relationship with God. Yet we don’t see the value, the worth in investing in that relationship.
While some would rather spend their resources on imaginary works of art, spend your time and energy exploring your own worth and destiny.
You were bought at a price! Own it!
“For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Corinthians 6:20, NKJV).
"For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?" (Mark 8:36, ESV).
The Value of a Bottle of Water
Currently, a bottle of water in a Costco vending machine costs about $0.25.
The same bottle in an average supermarket costs between $0.50 and $1.00.
If ordered at a bar it may cost around $2.00-$4.00.
In a restaurant or hotel, it can cost up to $3.00, $4.00, or more.
At an airport, amusement park, or theater, you may be charged $5.00-$6.00.
The bottles and the contents are all roughly the same. The only thing different is the location where you purchase them. In Costco, you’re expecting a discount, and you get one. In a grocery store, you expect you’ll pay a fair retail fee. From there, depending on the location, you expect a certain amount of mark-up, adjusted for ambiance, necessity, or convenience, with each location dictating the “value’ of the same product.
Have you ever felt your own value fluctuate depending on where are? Dining at a celebrity gala might give you a “sense” of having a greater value than if you were dining at a fast-food restaurant or asking for a handout at a soup kitchen.
Attending an Ivy League school might give you a greater “sense” of value than attending a community college, or no college at all. Fellowshipping with dear friends or treasured loved ones may leave you feeling more valued than mingling amongst a group of mere acquaintances or strangers.
Always remember that your true value is ascribed to you, not by your circumstances, but by your Creator. No matter where you are or who you're with, you are worth the life and death of the very Son of God. Your value is immeasurable; as infinite and eternal as the value of the Savior Himself.
That being so, don't allow anyone to detract from the value which God Himself has placed on you. You were created in the image of God, and in Christ, you are a child of the Living God and a joint-heir with Jesus. The eternal Kingdom of God is yours along with all of its benefits.
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Gen 1:27 (ESV)
“[A]nd if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ …” Rom 8:17a (NKJV)