Work = Worth?

Have you noticed you have been in training all your life? Whether you realize it or not, you have been trained to understand your worth and value is based on a work=worth basis. Think about it.

When you are a baby you are rewarded based on how well you listen and behave.

When you are in school, if you do good work (study hard), then you will get good grades and your parents will be proud of you.

When you get a job, if you do good work (get the job done), then you will get a promotion and with a promotion...more money, then you will be worth more.

When you are older, if you do good work (own a nice home, have a good savings, have two kids and a expensive car), then you have made it and are successful.

Whether you realize it or not, this idea is ingrained deep in the fibers of your understanding of the world. Unfortunately this is such a deeply rooted belief that often times we translate it over to our spiritual journey. We look at God as a work=worth based system. But we replace the IFs with more spiritual things, nevertheless they are still IFs.

In our spiritual walk we think things like....

If I go to church this many times, if I read my Bible everyday, if I pray this many times a day, if I give this much, if I volunteer this much, if I dress this way, if I talk this way, if I (you fill in your blank), THEN God will love me!

This is so different from the kind of love and acceptance we see God showing in the scriptures. In the scriptures we see a God that is grace based. In fact over and over we read things like..."and this is not of your works but a gift from God" and "We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are."

In fact when we look at the most famous verse in the Bible...John 3:16 which says..."For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whomever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life." Let's look at verse 17 also ..."For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." Now in those two verse, who is doing all the work? GOD. All we have to do is believe in Him.

The problem of work=worth religion is that our focus becomes us, specifically our works and not God. And my focus usually is on my bad works. So I tend to see all my failing as a Christian and my sense of worth drops lower and lower.

The Bible paints a completely different picture. The Bible says that when you accept Christ, you are hidden in Christ. Now if you are hidden in Christ and God looks at you, who does he see?

According to the scriptures, its not about who you have failed to be, its about who Jesus has succeeded in being. It's not about doing things to make God love you. God already loves you. God already loves you.

When God looks at you, He sees Christ! So you no longer have to compete with others so that you may feel more valuable or loved. You no longer have to be better than, faster than, smarter than, richer than, etc. than, others because God loves you.

There is nothing you can do to make God love you less!

There is nothing you can do to make God love you more!

God loves you just because!