Looking in the Wrong Place (Part 2)

Devotion for the Week...

Last week I wrote about the wrong places some people look for the way to eternal life in Heaven. Today I want to look at the ways people look in the wrong places for their worth.

How often do we judge our worth by what we do, and how well we do it?

Whether it's our job, our volunteer activities, our children or our skills, we are looking to what we do to show us our significance and our worth.

We don't consciously think, "I'm important because I'm a nurse," or "I'm a good person because my children are well behaved." Sometimes, though, we can feel that way without realizing it.

Think of all the labels you can attach to yourself because of things you do.

Now imagine all those things stripped away, so you no longer do them. The labels no longer apply.

Who are you now?

Do you have significance and value if you can no longer work, volunteer, quilt, discipline your children...or whatever your labels may have been?

Of course you do!

King David wrote in Psalm 139:13-16:

For you created my inmost being;

you knit me together in my mother's womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

My frame was not hidden from you

when I was made in the secret place.

When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,

your eyes saw my unformed body.

All the days ordained for me 

were written in your book

before one of them came to be.

God created each and every one of us. That fact alone reveals a significance and value that can never be measured. I take great pride in all the quilts I have made, just because I made them. How much more does God take pride in each one of us because we are His handiwork?

As if that weren't enough, read what David wrote in verses 1-3 of Psalm 139:

O Lord, you have searched me

and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;

you perceive my thoughts from afar.

you discern my going out and my lying down;

you are familiar with all my ways.

Not only did God create us, He considers us worthy of His focused attention! Think about it for a moment. He knows when you sit down, and when you stand up again, when you go out and when you lie down. Those are tiny details.

I have a wonderful husband and three fantastic boys. I love them all. But I do not know every time they sit down or stand up. Even when I'm in the same room, I may not notice those details because they are so small. Yet God always notices those details about us. He pays such close attention that He knows everything about us.

We've got it wrong if we're looking at what we do to give us significance and value. We have both simply because we exist - because God created us and cares deeply about us.