You Are of Great Value!

DO your job, your spouse, your house, and your achievements determine your true value? If that were so, losing a job or having a disagreement in the family would certainly be disastrous to one's self-esteem. But these things do not, in fact, decide our value. God, our creator, has already done that.

In addressing his disciples, Matthew's Gospel reports, Christ Jesus indicated the intrinsic value that man has as God's expression. He said: ``Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows'' (10:29-31).

Even in the midst of economic and social changes, we can find genuine security and a sure cognizance of our intrinsic value by learning more of our value in God's eyes.

Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer of Christian Science, shows us how to awake to our true value and the lasting stability we yearn to experience. In her Message to The Mother Church for 1902, she points out: ``Happiness consists in being and in doing good; only what God gives, and what we give ourselves and others through His tenure, confers happiness: conscious worth satisfies the hungry heart, and nothing else can.'' (p. 17).

Understanding that our Father-Mother, God, created man in His own image and likeness, wholly spiritual, enables you to get a glimpse of how very precious you, His child, are to Him. As God's offspring, you express His perfection. The God-given qualities you express as Spirit's offspring are fundamental to your genuine, spiritual worth. Your value could never be expressed in dollars and cents, for it goes beyond the bounds of human estimation. God knows your inherent worth. It lies in your eternal closeness to Him.

Even if, for a time, you have thought that God was unnecessary in your life--or that you weren't ``good enough'' for His love--He has never abandoned you or stopped loving you. In reality, you can never stop being what you are--His cherished reflection. Whenever I catch myself feeling worthless or unloved, I reexamine my life to see whether I am feeling estranged from God--from that which is the very center and circumference of my true being!

As a Christian Scientist I have found that as I reaffirm my relationship to the one creator, God, any temptation to think of myself as worthless disappears. This consciousness of God's love brings a greater sense of fulfillment, peace, and harmony into my experience. God and His ideas are an unfailing source of satisfying companionship and a very constant supply of good in my life.

Each one of us is vitally needed to express God. No one else will ever be able to express Him in just the way you do. Your unique identity is wholly beautiful and lovely because you are God's very own child. He is the source of all you are--your individual nature, your intelligent expression, your creative talents, your honesty, your kindness, your deep caring for all of God's children.

Mrs. Eddy, in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, makes clear that each of us is needed and valued. She writes: ``God, without the image and likeness of Himself, would be a nonentity, or Mind unexpressed. He would be without a witness or proof of His own nature. Spiritual man is the image or idea of God, an idea which cannot be lost nor separated from its divine Principle'' (p. 303).

Since you are, in fact, God's offspring, you can never lose God or become separated from divine Principle; you can never lose your value as His beloved child. Because you are His offspring, you actually never include any characteristic, trait, or quality that does not have its origin in God.

Becoming more conscious of your Godlikeness allows you to get reacquainted with your priceless individuality and inestimable value to God. Being conscious of your spiritual heritage, you will take joy in acting like the offspring of God. There is no one more special in all the world than you because you are the child of God! As you are daily conscious of your oneness with God, you will feel the blessing that this unbreakable relation to Him bestows!