You Are Precious To Me

relationship, transcendence, growing in the Faith

God has told us, each of us, how He values us:

Because you are precious in my eyes and honored, and I love you,. . . (Isiah 43:4)

Jesus put this ‘preciousness’ in His own words, what each of us means to His Father:

Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are?

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.  But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. (Matthew 10:29-31)

Without words, Jesus also preached about this divine valuing. He delivered this silent sermon from the Cross, announcing the infinite worth of each of us.

Precious

Since “God’s thoughts are not our thoughts,”  (Isiah 55:8), we can only interpret, in our language,  His inspiring the prophet Isaiah to use the human word ‘precious.’ “Precious” means: of great value or high price, highly esteemed, cherished, beloved, darling, adorable, lovable, and dear.

Now if one imagines that it is God Himself using this word, it must be the case that He considers each of us of greatest value, of highest price, most adorable, most lovable and most dear. That’s how God does things, no half measures, no bargain basement prices, no somewhat lovable or a little bit dear.  God is “all in” when it comes to how He values each of us. Not only is it true that “God don’t make no junk;” it is also true that He only makes priceless gems.

Once I told one of my most beloved, most beautiful granddaughters (this includes all six of them) that “Grandy loves you infinity.” From the mouths of babes, in her little wisdom and total love, she looked at me with her lovely sky-blue eyes that can melt glaciers and steal hearts, and said, “Grandy,  I love you infinity plus one.” For God, it is infinity plus infinity plus infinity . . .

Why Are You Precious To God?

How does God describe why we are precious to Him? Beyond everything in the list of definitions above, again and again in Holy Scripture, He tells us that we are His; not his property, but His children.

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you . . .  (Jer 1:5.)

But now this is what the Lord says, the one who created you, Jacob, the one who formed you, Israel: “Do not be afraid, because I’ve redeemed you. I’ve called you by name; you are mine. (Is 43:1)

Thus says the Lord who made you, your help, who formed you from the womb…’(Is 44:2)

As a mother and father hold each of their children beyond value, so God values each of His children. Like an artist who makes a work of art that he likes and cherishes, God has made each of us and has seen that each of us, like all of His creation, is good.

Precious/Unique

Tigger and The Seekers provide some insight into an aspect of our divine value which is beyond our human ideas of “precious.”

Tigger sings joyfully:

The wonderful thing about tiggers

Is tiggers are wonderful things! . . . .

But the most wonderful thing about triggers is

I’m the only one.

Like Tigger, each of us is wonderfully unique, not by some chance, random evolution of atoms or accidental flowing together of primordial oozes struck by a haphazard sunbeam. Each of us is wonderfully unique, the only one because the Artist who created us wanted us each to be special.

How special? How unique?  To paraphrase a 1960s No. 1 song hit of the group The Seekers, I Know I’ll Never Find Another You, God only made one of you:

I’ve made the whole world right there,

For you a promised land.

You can be there always,

If you only take my hand.

You still need Me there beside you,

No matter what you do,

For I know I’ll never make another you.

God didn’t make us by using one cookie cutter cutting out identical human cookies from a homogenous pile of generic human dough. For God each of us in precious in a unique way because in His almighty power He has made each of us singular, exceptional, like no other, beyond rare, extraordinary, and unique. He never has and He never will make another you.

Witness

This preciousness is not to be hidden, but accepted, acknowledged, and proclaimed. It is no mere coincidence that when God proclaims that you are precious to Him that He then goes on and says you, therefore, have a special role. You are to witness for Him:

You are my witnesses,” declares the Lord, “and my servant whom I have chosen, that you may know and believe me   and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me. I, I am the Lord,  and besides me there is no savior.”  . . .You are my witnesses! Is there a god or any rock besides me?(Is 43:10-11; 44:8)

To what are you commissioned to witness? To your own preciousness and to the divine value of each and every person God has created.

Conclusion

You alone, because you are precious and unique according to the will of God, are the only person who can provide the witness God makes possible through you. (see, e.g., http://www.catholiclane.com/each-person-is-a-divine-revelation/)

Isaiah 6:3 tells us that “the earth is full of God’s glory.” You are part of this glory, and so is each person you encounter every day. Your witness to this says, “Glory to God in the highest.”

 

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