Net Worth

The news this week has been all about the stock market. I read yesterday that Americans have lost several trillion dollars in net worth this past 2 weeks. The plunge has been breathtaking. I have been thinking of the term "net worth". I feel like God has been teaching me over and over the last several months that my worth needs to be placed in Him and Him alone. I tend to look for worth and value in all kinds of things. I don't feel preoccupied with my worth until I notice how much I compare myself with other people and how important what other people think is to me. Anyway, back to the market. I was thinking of how God must look at us and the closest I can get is how I look at my teenage daughter. Becca has a domain in our house that we have given over to her. It is her room. It is where she keeps her stuff and we let her keep her stuff however she wants as long as we can close her door. At times it looks like a clothes bomb went off sometime during the night in there. We provide the most important things in her life. All the stuff in her room is stuff she has accumulated over the last nearly 18 years. I was thinking what it would be like if something happened that reduced her stuff to less than half of what it is now. Maybe someone would come in with huge garbage bags and began to just load up a bunch of stuff indiscrimately. It would definitely cause Becca some pain. I on the other hand might look into her room and think it a good thing. Now if she wailed that her "net worth" had been reduced I would sit her down and look her in the eyes and say, "Oh, honey, all that stuff had nothing to do with your worth. Look me in the eyes and see the love I have for you. If your room is completely empty this love for you will not go away, it will not fade. You are mine, my princess, the apple of my eye and in the midst of your cleaned out room we will have a wonderful time just the two of us". So, as I have watched my room get cleaned out these last couple of weeks I have been sitting in a cleaned out room with the Lord of the universe and listened carefully about how He really feels about me. I can sit and wail as the garbage bags are hauled out of my room or I can run to my Father, the One who owns the whole house, and sit with him until I remember what my net worth is really based on.