Value and Meaning

Scripture tells us that we were made in the image and likeness of God.  Because we know this, we can determine certain attributes of God's character.  Two of those attributes are the importance of value and meaning.

Consider this:  why do you do what you do?  Do you eat because you can't help it or is there something else driving you?  Because you understand the link between eating and living, you eat.  But why do something to continue living?  That seems like an odd question, but take it seriously.  We continue living because for some reason or another we value life.  Why do you choose certain clothes over others, certain people over others, certain activities over others?  Value.  We do what we do because we value the process, the outcome, or both.

But how do we assign a value to things?  What determines our values?  I value my children because of what they mean to me.  I could go deeper into that but suffice it to say that what they mean to me determines the value they have to me.  We value highest what means the most to us.

So much of our existence is based in the reward that comes from the people, places, and things that mean so much to us.  There is an almost constant struggle to either gain that which means something or defend it.  Look at your life.  Is there any place in your life where you are not either going after something of value or fighting to keep something of value?  In that struggle is so much of the awesome stuff of life!  Like an amazing football game, the struggle for the win is the whole thing!  We eventually learn to value the struggle itself over the object we are trying to gain.  I value my relationship with my children and my wife, not because I own them and will never lose them, but because the struggle of the relationship is so full of danger and bliss.

Anything we truly value above all things involves risk.  Remember wanting to go to Prom with that certain someone?  Or how about asking someone to marry you?  What about the risks of child bearing?  How about starting that amazing company you've always dreamed of?  Risk, risk, risk.  We will struggle for what means the most to us.  We will risk for it; even die for it.

Now, imagine for a minute that you are God before time began.  You have all the power.  All of it.  Total and complete control.  If you can create whatever you want and do whatever you want with it, how are you supposed to value it?  I mean, if you give your children everything they want whenever they want it, they end up spoiled.  Why?  Because they did not have to struggle to earn any of it.  We do not value things that are granted, that cost us nothing.  So, if for God everything at the beginning of time was already granted, how does He value anything?  I mean, what gift can you give to the Man who has everything?

Ok, here comes the scripture....

Gen 1:28
28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

Here we see where God tells man that man is now in control of this earthly realm.  The implications of it are not readily apparent.  Luckily it is spelled out elsewhere:

Psa 8:4-6
4 What is man that You are mindful of him,
And the son of man that You visit him?
5 For You have made him a little lower than the angels,
And You have crowned him with glory and honor.
6 You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet

So, God created value by His own integrity and self-restriction!  He is sovereign, He is all powerful, but He set up this earthly existence in such a way that He could experience wins and losses by the choices of His own children!

So what has value for Him?  What means something to God?  What could a mortal possibly do for The Creator that would have any eternal meaning what-so-ever?  That we give Him the one thing He denied Himself:  our choice.  It's that simple.  For Him it is no different than it is for us.  We want our children, our loved ones, to choose us.

Have you ever thought about how much it tickles His fancy that you think about Him?  I mean, that you are even willing to consider an invisible God who loves you must just make Him sing.  We cannot please Him apart from faith because choosing to believe Him is literally the only thing we have to offer.  He wanted it that way.