You Are Valued

I believe it is natural to develop a sense of self-perception by noticing how the important people in our lives perceive us. Everyone bares scars from the act of living. It is a battlefield in so many ways. In a dysfunctional family, the deck is stacked against you. In this environment, the dysfunction becomes normal. How can a person see themselves any other way? How on earth can we see ourselves as God sees us? Understanding how God sees us and the value He places on us can help anyone overcome a negative self-perception. I am certain anybody can find self-worth, security, and comfort in every situation imaginable. For me, it’s been the prison experience and enduring unspeakable injustice. It isn’t worth the words to describe, but the self-perception, perhaps self-realization, of seeing things through God’s eyes is terrifying, humbling, and joyful.

King David thought about these things and wrote them down for posterity so the world could benefit from the wisdom. It amazed this king as he thought about how much God valued him. He said, “What are mere mortals that God should think about human beings?” He didn’t stop with the obvious question but accused God of something magnificent, “You (God) made humans only a little lower than God and crowned them with glory and honor, and gave them charge of everything. He made and put all things under their authority.”

He wondered about something every person in this universe thinks about sooner or later. How important is a man to God? The answer that came to him was surprising, and the world has benefited from it ever since. From this man, a king immortalized in history and all these centuries after, his praise inspires me: “How precious are your thoughts about me, Oh God! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand, and when I wake up, you’re still with me.”

When I feel like I’m different from other people, for better or worse, it would come easy to be hard on myself. I am reminded by a man named David that every one of us is made of the same stuff - good and bad. It helps me to remember that we’re not so different from one another.